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THE STORY OF THE GREAT LAKES 



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THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 




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THE STORY OF THE 
GREAT LAKES 



BY 

EDWARD CHANNING 

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY 

AND 

MARION FLORENCE LANSING 

EDITOR OF THE ** OPEN ROAD LIBRARY " 



IVITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS 



Kcbj gorfe 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1909 

ylll rights reser'ved 



o^^ 



lUBKARY of CONGRESS 
Two Co Dies Received 

MAK 20 ^80y 

CLASS O- '^^ "^o- 
COPY 'O. 



Copyright, 1909, 
By the MACMILLAN COMPANY. 



Set up and electrotyped. Published March, 1909. 



Norivood Press 

J. S. Cusbing Co. — Berivick & Smith Co. 

Norwood^ Mass., U.S.A. 



PREFACE 

For three hundred years the Great Lakes 
have been the centre of an immensely varied and 
interesting history. They were originally the 
home of savages ; they were discovered and ex- 
plored by Frenchmen ; they became the scene 
of a century-long struggle for possession by In- 
dians of many tribes and white men of three 
nations ; and they have been finally occupied 
and developed by Americans. In every epoch 
they present a rich field for study. 

No minute and exhaustive chronicle has been 
attempted in this volume, but important events, 
with the customs and life of each period, have 
been brought together and presented. Changes 
have come with such rapidity that the conditions 
of fifty years ago seem remote to-day. In this 
swift progress the heritage of the past must not 
be forgotten. The picturesqueness of the early 
life, the courage and hardihood of the explorers 
and settlers, and the tale of thrilling adventures 



vi Preface 

and noble deeds should be treasured, as should 
the achievements of the builders of cities and 
captains and soldiers of industry of our own 
day. 

Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
November, 1908. 



CONTENTS 



PART I 



Discovery and Exploration 



CHAPTER 
I. 



The Great Lakes . , . 

II. Champlain on the Great Lakes, 1615— 1616 

III. The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons, 1626— 1650 

IV. The Pageant of Saint Lusson, 1671 

V. The Building of the Griffon, 1 678-1 679 . 

VI. La Salle on the Great Lakes, 1679 . 

VII. A Hapless French Governor, 168 2-1 684 



PAGE 

3 
lo- 

25 

39 

49 
61 

73 



PART II 

The Struggle for Possession 

VIII. The Founding of Detroit, 1701 

IX. Niagara and the Loss of Canada, 1759 

X. The Conspiracy of Pontiac, 1763—1764 

XI. The Adventures of a Trader, 1761 — 1764 

XII. Wayne's Indian Campaign, 1794 . 

XIII. The Great Lakes in the War of i 8 1 2 

XIV. The Conquest of Lake Erie, i 8 i 3 . 
XV. General Lewis Cass and Reorganization, 

1832 ..... 
XVI. The Black Hawk War, 1832 



. 87 


lOI 


. 113 


. 135 


. 151 


. 165 


. 179 


I8I3- 


. 191 


201 



Vlll 



Contents 



PART III 
Occupation and Development 

CHAPTER 

XVII. Gateways of the Great Lakes, 1600— 1900 

XVIII. The Story of a Road, 1600- 1900 

XIX. Before and after the Turnpike, 1 796-1 81 1 

XX. The Erie Canal, 1825 

XXI. The Great Lakes in i 840 . 

XXII. The Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 
1836-1853 .... 

XXIII. Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago, 1858-186: 

XXIV. The Great Lakes in the Civil War, 186^ 
XXV. Three Great Industries of the Lakes 

XXVI. Shipping on the Lakes 
XXVII. The Development of the City . 

A Brief List of Books ..... 

Index ........ 



PAGE 

217 

228 
242 
251 
266 

283 
299 

356 

374 
385 
393 



MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS 



MAPS 

Huron — Erie — Ontario 

From Lake Michigan to the Mississippi 

Gateways of the Lakes 

By Trail and Turnpike to Lake Erie . 

By Canal and Railroad to Lake Erie . 



PAGE 
12 

202 
223 
232 
284 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

La Salle ..... 

The *'Soo" Canal 

Niagara Falls as sketched by Hennepin 

La Barre and Grangula 

A View of Niagara Fort . 

Black Hawk ..... 

Through the Locks at Lockport 

Chicago in 183 1 . 

An Early Lake Superior Copper Mine 

Iron Ore at a Lake Superior Port 

The Old and the New, General Cass's Canoe 

and a Modern Freight Steamer . 

Grain Elevator and Lumber Jam 

ix 



. Frontispiece 
facing page 8 

52 
^6 
104 
204 
256 
278 
348 
352 

360 
370 



PART I 
DISCOVERY AND EXPLORATION 



CHAPTER I 



THE GREAT LAKES 



STANDING in Lake Park, Chicago, beside 
the statue of General Logan, the supporter 
of Douglas and, later, of Lincoln, one has 
behind him the most marvellous city of modern 
times, and before him the southwesternmost of 
the Great Lakes. In front, glitter the waters 
over which La Salle journeyed three centuries 
ago. As in those days, they respond to the play 
of wind and weather, now calm as a sheet of glass, 
and now swept by sudden gales into turbulent 
waves and breakers ; but the aspect of the land 
is such that were La Salle to visit it he would not 
recognize the spot. In place of a wilderness with 
an occasional group of low-lying Indian wigwams 
he would see a mighty city of buildings towering 
one hundred and fifty feet above the street and 
reaching down from twenty-five to fifty feet below 
ground. In place of a few canoes with their loads 
of furs and crews of savages, emerging from the 

3 



A The Story of the Great Lakes 

narrow mouth of the Chicago River, seven thou- 
sand freighters and steamers with an aggregate 
tonnage greater than that floated in any other 
port in the world touch annually at the wharves 
along her splendid harbor front. These vessels 
and thousands of trains, running on tracks whose 
mileage is more than a third of that of the whole 
railway system of the United States, bring to her 
stockyards, her grain elevators, and her markets 
the herds and flocks of the western plains, the 
crops of the wheat-fields of the Northwest, and 
the merchandise of Europe and of Asia. 

Chicago is the greatest distributing centre of 
this region, but the ports of Lake Erie handle 
many important industries whose traffic never 
enters Lake Michigan. The copper of the upper 
Michigan peninsula, the iron ore of the Wiscon- 
sin and Minnesota ranges, the coal of Ohio and 
Pennsylvania, and many a minor industry have 
had their share in building up the modern empire 
of the Great Lakes. The body of water about 
which this empire has risen is made up of five 
lakes: Superior, Huron, Michigan, Erie, and 
Ontario, which together form the greatest inland 
waterway of the world. These lakes have an area 
of more than half that of the Black Sea or the 



The Great Lakes 5 

Caspian, while Lake Superior is the largest body 
of fresh water on the globe. The four upper 
lakes are so nearly level that one canal with a 
single lock has given them a navigable length 
of over fourteen hundred miles. Lake Ontario, 
however, is effectively separated from the others 
by Niagara Falls and its attendant rapids. Other 
great inland bodies of water are directly connected 
with the ocean by navigable straits. The Medi- 
terranean Sea is entered from the Atlantic by the 
Strait of Gibraltar, the Black Sea is connected in 
its turn with the Mediterranean by the Darda- 
nelles and the Bosphorus ; but Niagara closes 
direct navigation between the Great Lakes and 
the sea. 

Canals have done much in the last hundred 
years to alleviate the natural inaccessibility of 
the lake system. Eighty-five years ago the Erie 
Canal gave a water route from the eastern end of 
Lake Erie to the Hudson River and thus to the 
Atlantic Ocean. Five years later the Welland 
Canal passed round Niagara Falls and connected 
Lake Erie with Lake Ontario, and a third canal 
soon connected Lake Erie with the Ohio River. 
To-day a second era of canal building is upon us. 
The Welland Canal has been widened, making it 



6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

possible for boats of moderate draught to go from 
Lake Erie to Lake Ontario and thence by nu- 
merous small cuts around the rapids of the St. 
Lawrence to the Atlantic. The Erie Canal is 
being enlarged, and engineers dream of a time 
when it will be made sufficiently wide and deep 
for sea-going vessels to pass from the Atlantic 
Ocean to Lake Erie. The Hennepin Canal at 
Chicago will open a route from Lake Michigan 
by the Illinois and Mississippi rivers into the 
Gulf of Mexico. Each state bordering on the 
Great Lakes as well as every province of the 
Dominion of Canada is to-day planning extensions 
of this canal system. 

On the lonely shores past which La Salle and 
later explorers voyaged have been built villages, 
towns, and cities. This region is to-day the clear- 
ing-house of the commerce of the central plain of 
North America. From the western terminals of 
the lake routes railways pass over the plains and 
mountains of the Northwest to the Pacific ; from 
their eastern ports stretch lines to the seaboard 
cities of the Atlantic. The farms of the North- 
west send yearly one hundred and fifty million 
bushels of wheat, six hundred million bushels of 
oats, and a billion bushels of corn to Chicago and 



The Great Lakes 7 

Buffalo and thence to the eastern states and 
Europe. Coming from the west, the transconti- 
nental roads pay tribute at Chicago and then 
choose between the route north of Lake Erie via 
Detroit, or south via Cleveland. They unite at 
Buffalo and follow the Mohawk Valley to the 
Hudson and then to New York or Boston; or 
they pass the Alleghanies farther south and reach 
the coast at Philadelphia, Baltimore, or Norfolk. 
In any case, by land or water, from the north or 
from the west, these products come to the Great 
Lakes, and are carried from their ports to the fac- 
tories and markets of the East, or to steamers 
bound for Europe. This combination of land 
and water transportation makes the Great Lakes 
the keystone of American industry. 

We have spoken of the four upper lakes as 
united commercially into one great sea. Before 
Lake Superior could be entered from the others 
one formidable obstacle had to be overcome. 
Between Lake Superior and Lake Huron was a 
ledge of rocks half a mile long over which the 
waters ran in swirling rapids, forming the Sault 
(or Rapids of) Ste. Marie. At this point the 
famous " Soo " Canal has been constructed with 
a single lock which is the largest and costliest in 



8 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the world, though it will soon be surpassed by 
those at the entrance of the Panama Canal. This 
canal was built in 1855, when the presence of iron 
and copper deposits in Michigan, Wisconsin, 
and Minnesota was first discovered. To-day the 
tonnage passing yearly through it runs up into 
figures that are almost beyond belief; but these 
figures form the best single index of the traffic of 
the Great Lakes. In the seven open months of 
1907 there passed through the " Soo " one hun- 
dred million tons of freight valued at four 
hundred and fifty million dollars. This tonnage 
is nine times that of the Suez Canal. The mines 
whose discovery made necessary the cutting of 
the " Soo " Canal supply a large part of this 
freight. Of iron ore alone they send thirty-three 
million tons to the foundries and furnaces of 
Pittsburg and other centres, where the raw ma- 
terial is manufactured into articles of iron and 
steel which form the basis of modern civilized 
existence. From the deposits of the upper Mich- 
igan peninsula comes yearly one-seventh of the 
world's supply of copper. 

These figures give some idea of the importance 
of the Great Lakes in the economic development 
of the United States. Three hundred years have 



The Great Lakes 9 

seen this region converted from a wilderness 
peopled by Indian tribes to the uses of modern 
civilization. This time might well be shortened, 
since at the beginning of the nineteenth century 
the Great Lakes and bordering lands were still 
occupied by the red man and a few small villages 
and trading stations of the whites. It is indeed 
wonderful what changes a century has wit- 
nessed. 



CHAPTER II 

CHAMPLAIN ON THE GREAT LAKES 

ON the 28th of July, 161 5, Samuel de 
Champlain paddled out of the mouth 
of the French River into the waters 
of Georgian Bay, an arm of Lake Huron ; or, 
as he named it from its great expanse, the 
" Mer Douce," or " Freshwater Sea." With 
him was a young interpreter, Etienne Brule, who 
had been sent by Champlain when a mere lad to 
winter in the Huron country, and to learn from 
the Indians their languages and customs. As a 
member of this Huron party, in 16 10, he had 
been the first white man to look upon the waters 
of Lake Huron, the central of the five Great 
Lakes. Now Champlain himself had come, 
journeying from Montreal with a trading party 
of Indians. Some of the Indians had slipped 
away before the rest of the expedition was ready, 
taking with them a missionary. Father Joseph 
Le Caron had, therefore, made the journey a few 

10 



Champlain on the Great Lakes ii 

days before his leader, but at last Champlain had 
reached the marvellous sea of Indian story, and 
was on the point of exploring the region of the 
Great Lakes. 

He found the lands bordering the lakes occu- 
pied by three groups of Indians : the Iroquois, 
who were closely banded together into a league 
known as the Five Nations ; the Hurons, who 
were related to them, but were always at war with 
them ; and the Algonquins, who belonged to one 
great family, but were now divided into many 
widely scattered and independent tribes. 

The Five Nations of the Iroquois were joined 
in a loose but effective confederacy. Originally 
they had formed one great tribe, but internal 
dissension had split them into five, — the Mo- 
hawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Sene- 
cas. Legend states that Hiawatha had counselled 
union and had thus brought about the League 
of the Iroquois, which was the most important 
Indian organization north of Mexico. The con- 
federation was governed by fifty sachems, ten 
from each nation, who made up a grand council. 
Unanimity was required in all decisions, but 
when these were once arrived at the tribes were 
obedient. The Iroquois lived in a wide strip 



12 



The Story of the Great Lakes 



of country extending from Lake Erie and Lake 
Ontario eastward across central New York. 
They called this section of country " The Long 
House " from its resemblance in shape to one 
of their oblong dwellings. 



BUEON- ERIE -ONTARIO 



Zake 
Champlain 




The Algonquins occupied the greater part of 
the country from the St. Lawrence to Lake 
Superior and the Mississippi, and included the 
Illinois, Wisconsin, Chippewa, Ottawa, and other 
tribes of the lake region. In the centre of the 
Algonquin country, in a narrow district extend- 
ing eastward from Georgian Bay toward Lake 
Ontario, lived the Huron nation, a strong and 
prosperous tribe. Between them and the Iro- 
quois there was constant enmity, and for a time 



Champlain on the Great Lakes 13 

after the coming of the whites it was by no means 
certain which group of Indians would come out 
victorious. It was while this contest was at its 
height that Samuel de Champlain came to the St. 
Lawrence and in 1608 founded Quebec. It was 
to the Huron settlements he was journeying in 
the summer of 161 5. 

Champlain was born in southern France and 
had already won fame as an explorer. He had 
visited the West Indies, Mexico, and Central 
America, and had suggested the building of a 
ship canal at Panama. He had coasted the 
shores of New England and had been one of the 
first French colonists at the Bay of Fundy. 
After the founding of Quebec he had traversed 
the lake which now bears his name and had jour- 
neyed far and wide in the surrounding region. 
In these expeditions he had allied himself with 
the Indians of the St. Lawrence and had sup- 
ported them in their battles with the Iroquois. 

In the summer of 161 5, yielding to the clamors 
of the Hurons gathered at Montreal for their 
yearly traffic with the French, Champlain agreed 
to accompany them on an inroad into the Iro- 
quois country. He departed for Quebec to 
make needful preparations, but when he returned 



14 The Story of the Great Lakes 

after a delay of a few days he found that the 
impatient Indians had set out for their villages, 
taking with them Father Joseph Le Caron, a 
Recollect friar who had come out with him from 
France that spring as a missionary to the Indians. 
Champlain embarked immediately with ten na- 
tives, Brule, and another Frenchman on the 
journey to the Huron villages. He approached 
Lake Huron by the hard northern route, travel- 
ling up the Ottawa River, along the portage path 
to Lake Nipissing, across which he sailed, and 
down the French River. Indian tribes along the 
way encouraged the voyagers, telling them that 
the Lake of the Hurons was at hand. At length 
they came out from between the banks of the 
river into the waters of the lake. For more than 
a hundred miles they coasted southward along 
its eastern shores, working their way in and out 
among countless islands, till they reached the 
lower end of Georgian Bay. There they landed 
and proceeded by a well-beaten trail into the 
heart of the Huron country. 

From the moment when he entered the first 
Huron village Champlain recognized that this 
was an Indian community different from any 
that he had heretofore seen. He had come upon 



Champlain on the Great Lakes 15 

one of the most remarkable savage settlements 
on the continent. The people lived in perma- 
nent villages protected by palisades of crossed 
and intersecting trunks of trees. Not only was 
the land naturally fertile, but in the clearings 
between the stretches of heavy forests were cul- 
tivated fields of maize and pumpkins, and gay 
patches of sunflowers from the seeds of which the 
the Indians made oil for their hair. To Cham- 
plain coming from the roving Algonquins of the 
St. Lawrence and the barren country along the 
Ottawa, where the Indian population lived by 
hunting and fishing, the social advancement of 
this group of tribes seemed very great. 

The Hurons welcomed him with eager hospi- 
tality and took him from village to village, enter- 
taining him with lavish feasting and celebration, 
for he was the champion who was to lead them 
to victory against their hated foe the Iroquois. 
At the principal Huron village Carhagouha, a 
settlement of two hundred bark lodges enclosed 
in a palisade thirty-five feet high, Champlain 
found Father Le Caron, 

The priest had feared that his leader would 
not follow the Hurons, or that if he did he 
would be captured by the Iroquois. When he 



1 6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

looked up one morning and saw Champlain 
standing in the doorway of his dwelling his joy 
knew no bounds. He showed him the bark 
wigwam which the Indians, to prove the joy 
that they felt at his coming, were building for 
him. They had offered at first to lodge him in 
one of their common cabins, but Father Le 
Caron had remonstrated with them, representing 
that " to negotiate with God affairs so important, 
involving the salvation of their whole nation," 
he needed a place where he could be alone, far 
from the tumult of their families. So they had 
brought poles and bark and erected this lodge 
at the edge of the forest. Here he had raised 
an altar, and here on the I2th of August was 
celebrated the first mass ever held in the country 
of the Hurons. Curious Indians crowded about 
as the priest stood before his rude altar and led 
the devotions of the kneeling band of Frenchmen 
with Champlain at their head. For the first time 
the solemn chant of the " Te Deum Laudamus " 
rang out on the listening air, and a volley of 
muskets proclaimed the planting of a cross out- 
side the priest's lodge. The symbol of Christian- 
ity had been raised in the country of the heathen ! 
Before they set out on the war-path the Huron 



Champlain on the Great Lakes 17 

chiefs insisted on a weary succession of feastings 
and dancings, rejoicing in their serene conviction 
of victory to come. Champlain spent the time 
going from village to village, gratifying his insati- 
able curiosity over everything which he saw. At 
last the savage war-party was ready to set out. 
They crossed Lake Simcoe and paddled, making 
the necessary portages, down the chain of inter- 
vening lakes to the river Trent, which flowed 
into Lake Ontario. The country through which 
the long line of canoes passed was singularly 
beautiful. Champlain found it hard to believe 
that the groves of walnut trees, whose branches 
were twined with hanging grapevines, had not 
been set out by the hand of man to form a beau- 
tiful artistic picture. The party stopped once 
and encamped for a grand deer-hunt, and then 
proceeded on its way, well-stocked with provi- 
sions for the first days in the enemies' country. 
Out upon Lake Ontario the frail canoes ventured, 
and crossed it in safety, landing on the eastern 
side of the lake, thirty miles or so from Oswego. 
Now a change came over the warriors. Si- 
lently they hid their canoes in the woods, and 
with stealthy and rapid steps they filed in silence 
through the borders of this hostile country. For 



1 8 The Story of the Great Lakes 

four days they marched inland through the for- 
est, crossing the Oneida River at the western end 
of the lake, and on the 9th of October some of 
their scouts brought in a captured fishing party 
of eleven Iroquois, men, women, and children. 
A Huron chief took possession of the prisoners 
and began to torture them, cutting off a finger 
of one of the women. Champlain met this 
method of celebration with angry protest, declar- 
ing that it was not the act of a warrior to treat 
helpless women with cruelty. The chief agreed, 
since it was displeasing to Champlain, to do 
nothing more to the women, but added that he 
would do to the men what he pleased. It was 
a curious position in which Champlain had placed 
himself, aiding one group of savages against 
another, nor did he find it to his liking. 

The next day the war-party came out into a 
clearing in the forest, from which they could see 
the Iroquois fort. A number of Iroquois were 
gathering corn and pumpkins in the adjoining 
fields. With a rush the impetuous young Hurons 
who were in advance screamed their war-cry and 
fell upon them. The Iroquois seized their arms 
and defended themselves with such success that 
their assailants began to fall back. Only the 



Champlain on the Great Lakes 19 

timely aid of Champlain and the Frenchmen with 
their terrifying muskets saved the invaders from 
defeat. 

Champlain saw that this irregular way of fight- 
ing, each person according to his whim, would 
result in utter ruin. The Hurons withdrew into 
the forest to encamp for the night, and there 
he addressed them angrily, showing them their 
foolishness and instructing them in the best 
methods of war. He found the Iroquois village 
to be far more strongly defended than any that 
he had seen among the Indians. Four rows of 
palisades, made of trees thirty feet high, sup- 
ported a kind of gallery, which was provided 
with wooden gutters for quenching fire and piled 
high with a goodly supply of stones to hurl at the 
enemy. This was a stronghold that could not 
be captured by the haphazard methods of the 
Hurons. Champlain set the Indians to work the 
next morning building a wooden tower, high 
enough to overlook the palisades and large 
enough to shelter four or five marksmen. In 
four hours the work was done, and two hundred 
of the strongest warriors dragged it forward to a 
position from which the musketeers could pour a 
deadly fire into the crowded galleries. The rank 



20 The Story of the Great Lakes 

and file of the Hurons were meanwhile equipped 
with huge wooden shields to protect themselves 
against the arrows and stones of the enemy. As 
the deadly bullets fell among them the Iroquois 
rushed headlong from the gallery, and the result 
of the battle would have been very different had 
the Hurons followed out Champlain's well-con- 
ceived plans ; but they were ungovernable. With 
reckless fury they threw away their shields, and 
yelling their war-cry so shrilly that no command 
could be heard, they poured out into the open 
field, discharging their own arrows but exposing 
themselves meanwhile to a rain of stones and 
arrows from the Iroquois. One Huron, bolder 
than the rest, ran forward with firebrands to burn 
the palisade, and others followed him with the 
dry wood which they had gathered for the 
purpose. But they set the fire on the leeward 
side of the fort, where the wind was against it, 
and torrents of water poured down from above 
soon put it out. In vain Champlain shouted 
commands and made every effort to restore 
order. He soon decided that his shouting would 
only " burst his own head ** and have no effect 
on any one else. So he and his Frenchmen set 
to work picking the Iroquois off the rampart 



Champlain on the Great Lakes 21 

with their shots. After three hours of this kind 
of fighting the Hurons fell back. 

Only eighteen men had been wounded, but 
among them were two chiefs and Champlain 
himself. He had received one arrow in the knee 
and another in the leg. He urged the Indians 
to renew the attack, but they refused. From 
extreme overconfidence the warriors had passed 
to the deepest discouragement. The next day 
a violent wind offered them an opportunity to 
set fire to the fort, but the Hurons sat silent in 
their camp. For five days they waited to see 
if the five hundred allies which Brule and twelve 
Hurons had started a month ago to fetch would 
appear. During this time they ventured out 
occasionally for imprudent skirmishes, each time 
running back under the cover of the French 
musket fire, amid taunts from the Iroquois on 
the palisade that the Hurons had very little 
courage to require French assistance. Then 
they hastily began to retreat, carrying their 
wounded in the centre, while the Iroquois har- 
assed the fianks and rear of the company. The 
wounded, Champlain among them, were packed 
in rude baskets made on the spot, and bound 
on the backs of stout warriors. Champlain gives 



22 The Story of the Great Lakes 

a vivid picture of the suffering he endured, while 
he was thus " bundled in a heap, and doubled 
and strapped together in such a fashion that it 
was as impossible to move as for an infant in 
swaddling-clothes." The torment from the 
cramped position and constant jolting was so 
much worse than even the pain of his wound 
that as soon as he could possibly bear his weight 
on his leg he got out of " this prison/' 

Snow and hail overtook the party on their 
dismal march to the lake. They were relieved 
to find their hidden canoes safe, and embarked 
once more on Lake Ontario. In his vain efforts 
to get the Indians to renew the attack after their 
first defeat, Champlain had come to see that he 
had lost some of his peculiar influence over them. 
They had fancied that his presence would ensure 
victory. Now they saw him wounded, and by 
Indian weapons. Their superstitious reverence 
for the "man with the iron breast" was weakened. 
Here on the shores of Lake Ontario he was to 
experience a very practical consequence of his 
loss of prestige. The Hurons had promised him 
an escort to Ouebec : but each warrior found a 
reason why he should not be able to lend his 
canoe for the journey. The chiefs who had made 



Champlain on the Great Lakes 23 

the promises had little control over their men, 
and Champlain found that he must winter with 
the natives. The great war-party broke up. 
Some went to hunt deer and bears, others to 
trap beavers, others to fish in the frozen lakes 
and streams, and still others returned to their 
villages. One of the chiefs offered Champlain 
the shelter of his cabin, which he was glad to 
accept, and he settled down to get what com- 
fort and information he could from his forced 
visit. 

Fifty pages of Champlain's minute and won- 
derfully illustrated account testify to the fact that 
he was not idle during the winter months. He 
records many interesting customs of his Indian 
hosts. He watched their deer-hunts, visited their 
villages and those of neighboring tribes, was 
umpire in their disputes, and at last turned his 
face homeward in the early spring. With him 
went Darontal, his Huron host. At Quebec 
Champlain was welcomed as one risen from the 
dead, for the Indians had long since brought in 
word that he had been killed. A solemn service 
was held, and all united in rendering thanks to 
God for protecting the travellers in their many 
perils and dangers. Upon this service and the 



24 The Story of the Great Lakes 

various acts of welcome Darontal gazed in be- 
wildered astonishment. Champlain showed him 
all the marvellous details of civilization. With 
the usual Indian stolidity he observed everything 
carefully and calmly ; but at last his wonder 
broke down his reserve. Before he departed he 
told Champlain that he should never die con- 
tented until he had told his friends of the French 
way of living and seen them adopt it. With 
valuable presents and a warm invitation to come 
again with some of his friends, Darontal paddled 
back to his lodge in the woods with a story that 
must have taken months in the telling. 

This was Champlain^s last long trip of explora- 
tion. For the remaining years of his life the 
needs of the colony at Quebec held him fast. 
His writings, sold in the book-stalls of France, 
inspired others to cross the seas and to continue 
the exploration and settlement of the wilderness. 



CHAPTER III 

THE JESUIT MISSION TO THE HURONS 

FROM 1 615, when Father Joseph Le Caron 
celebrated the first mass among the Hu- 
rons, for fourteen years a few intrepid 
priests braved the difficulties of savage life, and 
endeavored at various times to set up missions in 
the populous Huron villages south of Georgian 
Bay. They suffered almost incredible hardships, 
and in 1629 Jean Brebeuf was the only one who 
was left in the region. He was recalled to 
Quebec, but five years later, a year before Cham- 
plain's death, he set out with two Jesuit compan- 
ions to found, in the villages where Champlain 
had wintered eighteen years before, the greatest 
Jesuit mission in the history of New France. 

No man in the annals of Church history has 
shown greater personal heroism than Father Jean 
Brebeuf He was tall and strong, well fitted to 
withstand the hardships of his chosen calling and 
to impress the Indians with his power. The 

25 



2 6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

square cap and surpHce which he donned when 
he assembled them for instruction, in order, as 
he naively writes, to " give more majesty *' to his 
appearance, were never less needed. With natu- 
ral dignity he combined the power of a hfe con- 
secrated with the utmost fervor to God and his 
Church. Never during long years of service did 
he waver in his devotion nor shrink from any- 
thing that lay before him in his work. From 
his reports sent home to his superiors it is evi- 
dent that he made a deep impression on the 
Indians. In these detailed accounts of his ex- 
periences and of the savages among whom he 
worked we get a clear idea of the man. We see 
him on the long canoe journeys, sharing in the 
labor of paddling and portages, till even he, who 
already knew, as he says, " a little what it is to 
be fatigued," was so weary that his body could 
do no more. But he tells us how at these very 
times his soul experienced a deep peace such as 
it had never known before. In the most matter- 
of-fact way he accepts and records the continual 
hardships, never complaining of his lot, but writ- 
ing with rare modesty because his whole atten- 
tion is centred on the work instead of on himself. 
From his vivid pictures we learn, however, the 



The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons 27 

truth of one of his casual statements. " Truly," 
he says, " to come here much strength and pa- 
tience are needed; and he who thinks of coming 
here for any other than God will have made a 
sad mistake." 

In 1634 Father Brebeuf and his companions 
started on the northern journey by the Ottawa 
River and Lake Nipissing to the Huron country. 
They accompanied a party of Hurons who were 
returning from their annual summer trading visit 
to Quebec. This nine-hundred-mile trip took 
thirty days. Brebeuf kept count and found that 
they carried their canoes thirty-five times on 
portages one, two, and even three leagues long, 
covering the distance three and four times to 
transport even their small amount of baggage, 
and that they dragged the canoes through rapids 
at least fifty times, plunging into the icy water 
and cutting their feet on the rocky bottom. At 
night they slept on the bare earth or on hard 
rocks, stung by clouds of mosquitoes. Their 
only food was a small portion of Indian corn 
coarsely broken between two stones, which, 
though better than fasting, was regarded by the 
Jesuits as " no great treat." Yet, denying them- 
selves the ordinary necessaries of life, these priests 



28 The Story of the Great Lakes 

transported the precious vessels for the mass over 
all this weary way. 

The other Jesuits suffered even more than 
Brebeuf. Their goods were stolen ; they were 
separated from the rest of the Huron party, 
and deserted midway in the journey. It was 
weeks before the worn-out travellers rejoined 
their superior in the Huron village. After a few 
experiences like this in reaching the mission these 
wise priests composed a set of instructions to the 
brethren who should follow them on this Ottawa 
route. This code of behavior is highly charac- 
teristic of the methods of the French Jesuits. 
In every detail, — from not keeping the Indians 
waiting when they were ready to embark and not 
asking too many questions, to being careful that 
in the canoe the brim of the priest's hat did not 
annoy those who sat nearest him, — these Jesuit 
fathers aimed " not to be troublesome, even to a 
single Indian," and to "love them like brothers 
with whom you are to spend the rest of your 
life.'' In this spirit lay the success of all French 
effort among these savage peoples. 

At length Brebeuf landed on the southern 
shores of Georgian Bay, only to be deserted at 
the last moment by his Huron guides and left 



The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons 29 

standing in the midst of his baggage on the lonely- 
shore. He knew the place well, for he had lived 
three years in a neighboring village. This settle- 
ment had, however, been destroyed and its in- 
habitants had built their huts on another spot 
several miles away. Brebeuf hid his goods in 
the woods and set out alone by one of the gloomy 
forest paths, which brought him, to his great 
reHef, to the new village. At sight of him some 
one cried out, " Why, there is Echom come 
again," and at once every one ran out to salute 
and welcome him, calling, " What, Echom, my 
nephew, my brother, my cousin, hast thou then 
come again ? " His goods were fetched from the 
shore, and Brebeuf was established in the house 
of a leading chief As soon as his brother priests 
had arrived the Indians set about building a house 
for the Jesuits. Bad crops and famine had 
afflicted the people of late, and they rejoiced 
doubly at the coming of Brebeuf, feeling sure 
that now the crops would no longer fail. They 
wished, therefore, to provide for his staying in 
their village instead of that of their neighbors. 

The house which the missionaries had built 
for them was a constant wonder to the Indians. 
It was thirty-six feet long and twenty wide, and 



30 The Story of the Great Lakes 

looked from the outside like any Huron bark 
house. But within, the " black-robes " had made 
innovations which were the marvel of all their 
visitors. They divided the house into three 
apartments, separated by wooden doors such as 
the natives had never seen. The first room 
served as antechamber and storm door to keep 
out the cold. The second was that in which 
they lived. It was at once kitchen, carpenter 
shop, place for grinding wheat, dining room, par- 
lor, and bedroom. Beneath high wooden plat- 
forms, on which they placed their chests of 
goods, the missionaries slept on sheets of bark 
or beds of boughs covered with rush mats, with 
skins and their clothing for covering. The third 
part was their little chapel where they set up their 
altar, pictures, and sacred vessels, and celebrated 
mass every day. 

The house itself attracted scores of visitors, 
but when the clock and the mill were set going 
the astonishment of the Indians knew no bounds. 
No guest came who did not beg to be allowed to 
turn the mill, and as for the clock, they sat in 
expectant silence by the hour, waiting for it to 
strike. They all thought it some living thing, 
and when it began to strike they would look 



The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons 31 

about to make sure that all the "black-robes" 
were there and that no one was hidden to shake 
it. They named it " Captain of the Day/* and 
inquired for it as they would for a person, wish- 
ing to know what its food was and how many 
times it had spoken that day. The first time 
they heard it they asked what it said, and the 
clever Jesuits told them two things. "When he 
strikes twelve times, he says, 'Come, put on the 
kettle.*" This speech they remembered particu- 
larly well, for their own scanty meals were usu- 
ally in the morning and evening, and they were 
very glad during the day to take a share of the 
Fathers' repast. " But when he strikes four times, 
he says, ' Go out, go away, that we may close the 
door,' " the Jesuits told their guests, and imme- 
diately they rose and went out, leaving the weary 
Fathers free from the constant noise and chatter. 
The missionaries gathered the Indians for in- 
struction on every possible occasion, teaching the 
children their prayers in Huron rhymes and 
preaching and explaining the faith to their elders. 
The converts, save those baptized on the point 
of death or in some fear of deadly peril, were few, 
but the worthy Fathers persisted and won the 
gratitude of the people by their help in time of 



32 The Story of the Great Lakes 

famine and their kindly ministrations to the sick. 
Other Jesuits joined them and founded additional 
missions in neighboring villages. The Indians 
never understood these mysterious white men, but 
regarded them with superstition, holding them 
answerable for bad weather, famine, and the like, 
and on the other hand honoring them when all 
was prosperous. The medicine men and sorcer- 
ers were constantly against them, and in 1637 
Father Isaac Jogues, one of the leading Jesuits, 
heard the rumor that the white men were reported 
to have bewitched the nation and must therefore 
be cut off. The assembly of Huron chiefs met, 
and the Jesuit fathers addressed them as usual on 
their unfailing topic, the joys of heaven and the 
fires of hell, the latter being always the only part 
of the instruction that seemed to make any im- 
pression on the stolid audience. For the time 
being the Fathers escaped ; but they were still in 
great peril. Brebeuf wrote a letter of farewell to 
his superior at Quebec, and no Jesuit left the 
house without the expectation of having a toma- 
hawk crash into his head before he returned. 
The unflinching courage of the Fathers won the 
Indian respect. The Jesuits even went so far as 
to give, according to the usual Indian custom for 



The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons ^3 

one on the point of death, a farewell feast to all 
the savages, an act which was regarded as a dec- 
laration that they knew their peril and faced it 
boldly. From that time forth their supporters 
rose in defence of them. For the moment the 
danger was averted and the Jesuits walked abroad 
once more. From now on, however, their per- 
secution as sorcerers continued at intervals in 
different places, rising now and then to a storm 
of superstitious frenzy. 

During the next five years the Jesuits extended 
their missions among the Hurons till almost 
every town had resident priests. They established 
on the shores of the river Wye a central station, 
which by 1648 had grown into a prosperous com- 
munity with buildings which would accommodate 
sixty persons. Pioneers went out to neighboring 
nations. Brebeuf and a companion journeyed to 
the Neutral Nation which lived north of Lake 
Erie and west and south of Lake Ontario, but 
were met with strong opposition stirred up by the 
superstitious Hurons, who conceived that it would 
be an easy and safe method of getting rid of the 
priests to have their neighbors kill them. The 
two escaped after great hardship and danger. 
Isaac Jogues and Charles Garnier went with at- 



34 The Story of the Great Lakes 

tendants to the Tobacco Nation, which lived two 
days* journey distant to the southwest, but were 
as rudely repulsed. Jogues was a young man of 
indomitable will to whom hard tasks seem always 
to have been assigned because of his complete 
self-surrender and consequent power. To him 
fell, nevertheless, in the autumn of 1641 the 
pleasant duty of visiting a tribe in the far west 
who had invited the priests to come to them. At 
Lake Nipissing in September the Jesuits met 
certain savages called Ojibways, who urged the 
"black-gowns'* to visit them in their homes, and 
gave directions for the journey. In accordance 
with this invitation Jogues and Raymbault, with 
a small Huron escort, set sail on Lake Huron 
and after a voyage of seventeen days reached the 
rapids where dwelt their friends at the location of 
the modern Sault Ste. Marie. Here they found 
about two thousand savages who welcomed them 
cordially and looked and listened with awe as the 
priests celebrated mass and explained their doc- 
trines. They invited the Fathers to take up 
their abode with them, saying that they would 
"embrace them like brothers and profit by their 
words," but the Jesuits could not be spared from 
their other work. Jogues listened with interest 



The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons j^ 

to tales of a great lake beyond the Sault, which it 
took nine days to cross, and of a great river be- 
yond, where dwelt mighty nations, "who," the 
Fathers reported to Paris, "have never known 
Europeans or heard of God." They could not 
stay, but sailed away, naming the place of their 
sojourn Ste. Marie after the mission from which 
they came. They were not the first white men 
to visit this strait. Nicolet, a voyager and trader, 
had travelled with Brebeuf in 1634 as far as the 
Huron mission and had then pushed on alone to 
the foot of these rapids and thence along the 
shores of Lake Michigan, greeted everywhere by 
crowds of wondering savages. It was left, how- 
ever, to these pioneer missionaries to give to this 
important waterway the name which it still bears. 
Jogues returned to the Huron mission and 
wintered there, starting in the spring of 1642 for 
Quebec with the Huron traders to bring supplies 
to the mission, which was in a state of destitution. 
As he was returning up the St. Lawrence River 
he and his companion, Goupil, were captured by 
the Iroquois, who led them to the Mohawk towns. 
There most of the Hurons of the party were 
killed, and Jogues and his white companion were 
tortured and terribly mutilated. Goupil lost his 



36 The Story of the Great Lakes 

life in the Iroquois camp, but Jogues was finally 
rescued by Dutch allies of the Mohawks and sent 
to Europe. From there he returned to New 
France and was tortured and killed by the Iro- 
quois in 1646. 

Isaac Jogues was the first Jesuit to fall in the 
progress of that warfare which was to bring to a 
tragic end the Jesuit mission to the Hurons by 
wiping out the towns in which the missionaries 
labored. The journey from Quebec to the 
Huron country was now fraught with peril from 
the marauding bands of Iroquois warriors. Two 
years after the first capture of Jogues an expedi- 
tion led by Brebeuf reHeved the needs of the 
missionaries by bringing supplies. That same 
year another Jesuit on his way to the mission 
was taken by the Iroquois, but in 1645 ^ tempo- 
rary peace rekindled the hopes of the Fathers. 
Three years later the warfare broke out with 
renewed fury, and it soon became evident that 
the Huron nation was doomed. Large bands of 
Hurons, deserting their towns, fled into the 
interior. The Jesuits aided those who remained 
to defend their homes, but town after town was 
taken and one after another Jesuit fell into the 
hands of the Iroquois and suffered martyrdom 



The Jesuit Mission to the Hurons 37 

with cruel tortures. The story of the tragic 
death of Jean Brebeuf, the founder of the mission, 
is one of wonderful strength and endurance amid 
most revolting tortures. The few remaining 
Jesuits withdrew with the terrified Indian surviv- 
ors to an island in Lake Huron, which they were 
able for a time to defend, but the Iroquois lay in 
an ambuscade and captured the fugitives when- 
ever they went ashore. At the earnest entreaty 
of the chiefs of the doomed nation the Jesuits 
gathered the remnant of their people and aban- 
doned with them the desolated country which 
had been for thirty-five years the seat of mission- 
ary labors. Sadly they proceeded on the long 
journey to Quebec, passing everywhere deserted 
villages which had been partially destroyed by 
fire. Once they were attacked by the Iroquois, 
but at length reached Quebec in safety. The 
Iroquois had driven the Hurons from their homes 
to perish by famine and pestilence until the whole 
nation was practically wiped out, and the most 
important field of Jesuit missions was turned into 
a solitude and a desolation. The future for 
French missions looked dark indeed, and for a 
time western exploration was also abandoned. 
Within four years hope of better success in 



38 The Story of the Great Lakes 

converting the heathen appeared in an unexpected 
spot. The crafty Iroquois, attacked by their 
southern neighbors, sent overtures of peace to 
Quebec and invited to their villages the once 
hated Jesuit priests. Father Le Moyne was the 
first to respond, and others followed, eager to 
convert this savage people. The first mission 
was brought to a speedy end by the uprising of 
the Iroquois against the remaining Hurons and 
their former white allies in 1658, but by 1665 
the government of New France was strong enough 
to mete out deserved punishment to the maraud- 
ing parties of Iroquois warriors, and by 1668 
a mission was established in each of the Five 
Nations. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE PAGEANT OF SAINT LUSSON 

WITH the destruction of the Huron mis- 
sions western exploration ceased for a 
few years. In 1660 Father Menard 
passed through the Sault Ste. Marie and spent a 
winter ministering to the Indians on the southern 
shore of Lake Superior. In the following 
summer he set out on an inland journey from the 
lake and was never heard from again. In the 
same year, however, two fur-traders, Radisson 
and Groseilliers, coasted along the shore of Lake 
Superior and Lake Michigan and were followed 
by many Jesuit missionaries whose names have 
become famous. Two principal mission stations 
were established, one at Sault Ste. Marie, the 
other at La Pointe at the western end of Lake 
Superior. At these places missionaries and 
traders heard many tales of a great river to the 
south and of rich copper deposits in the lake 
region, which in turn led to more exploring expe- 
ditions. 

39 



40 The Story of the Great Lakes 

At Sault Ste. Marie, in 1671, there was a pic- 
turesque ceremony when Daumont de Saint Lus- 
son, agent of Louis XIV, took possession of the 
interior of North America in the name of his 
king. For months the French and the Indians 
had been preparing for this pageant. Messages 
had been sent to all the Indian tribes living within 
one hundred leagues of Ste. Marie, urging them 
to attend, and Nicholas Perrot, a Canadian voyager 
and interpreter, had visited many of the tribes in 
person to make sure of their coming. With a 
large Indian following, he paddled up the Strait 
of Mackinac from Lake Michigan and landed at 
the foot of the rapids. Saint Lusson was already 
there with fifteen men. The French leaders were 
housed at the mission station, while the savages 
made themselves comfortable in temporary lodges 
erected along the stretch of shore and in the 
fields. Gradually tribe after tribe from the north 
and the west arrived, and on the 14th of June, 
when fourteen tribes or their representatives had 
come. Saint Lusson announced that the ceremony 
would take place. 

The Frenchmen, led by Saint Lusson, as- 
sembled in the village, and crowds of curious 
Indians gathered about the small group of white 



The Pageant of Saint Lusson 41 

men. The French soldiers had brought out their 
gayest uniforms and had polished their swords 
and muskets till they shone in the sunlight. 
Coureurs de bois — runners of the woods — 
and other Indian traders stood about in 
their rough picturesque costumes. At the head 
of the line walked four Jesuits arrayed in the 
impressive vestments of the priesthood. The 
names of these four men stand to-day as they 
signed them at the foot of the instrument which 
records this act of taking possession. They were 
a group of priests noteworthy in the history of 
the lakes. At one end stood Father Claude 
Dabion, the Superior of the Missions of the 
Lakes ; next him came Gabriel Druilletes, a vet- 
eran missionary, whose experience with the Indians 
exceeded probably that of any Frenchman in 
Canada, and who had been sent by the govern- 
ment years before on a mission to the English colo- 
nists on the Atlantic to invite their cooperation 
against the Iroquois. Father Claude Allouez had 
followed Father Menard in the Lake Superior 
country and founded the La Pointe Mission, and 
Father Louis Andre was establishing a station 
among the Ottawas at Manitoulin Island. 
Father Allouez had been obliged to leave the 



42 The Story of the Great Lakes 

young Jesuit missionary Marquette in charge at 
La Pointe. Had he been with his brother 
priests, the circle of famous names would have 
been complete. 

Led by these four men, the line of Frenchmen 
— a motley company of soldiers, priests, explorers, 
and traders — marched up the hill to a height 
which had been selected because it overlooked 
the surrounding country. On either side of the 
column and behind it hovered the vast throng 
of dusky Indians. As the Frenchmen halted and 
grouped themselves about a huge cross of wood 
that lay on the ground, the Indians fell into posi- 
tion behind them and stood silent, waiting to see 
what the "white faces" would do. When all 
was quiet, Father Dablon, as Superior of the Lake 
Missions, stepped forward and blessed the cross 
with all the ceremonies of the Church. At a 
sign from Saint Lusson the holy wood was lifted, 
and as the foot of the standard fell into the 
opening prepared for it, the Frenchmen sang 
with all their hearts the ancient hymn of their 
church : — 

*« The royal banners forward go. 

The Cross shines forth in mystic glow: 
:1c ^ Hi * 



The Pageant of Saint Lusson 43 

Fulfilled is all that David told. 

In true prophetic song of old; 

How God the heathen's King should be. 

For God is reigning from the tree." 

As they looked from the mighty cross to the 
horde of assembled savages the Frenchmen felt 
that to-day as never before these words were ful- 
filled. The uncomprehending Indians, who 
gazed at the pageant with wondering delight in 
its pomp, little knew how the minds of these 
white men were filled with the vision of a time, 
of which this was the forerunner, when these red- 
skinned savages should be followers of the 
heavenly King of the French and the obedient 
retainers of their earthly monarch. 

Beside the cross was erected a cedar pole to 
which was nailed a metal plate engraved with the 
royal arms of France. As this was being raised 
the Frenchmen chanted the twentieth Psalm, " In 
the name of our God we will set up our banners," 
and one of the Jesuits, even " in that far-away 
corner of the earth," as the record says, offered a 
prayer for the French king in whose name all this 
was being done. Thus side by side the stand- 
ards of the two monarchs were raised in the wil- 
derness, and Saint Lusson, stepping forward amid 



44 The Story of the Great Lakes 

an expectant hush, with a sword in one hand and 
a sod of earth in the other, took formal possession 
of the soil with these words: — 

" In the name of the most high and redoubt- 
able sovereign, Louis the Fourteenth, Christian 
King of France and Navarre, I now take posses- 
sion of all these lakes, straits, rivers, islands, and 
regions lying adjacent thereto, whether as yet 
visited by my subjects or unvisited, in all their 
length and breadth, stretching to the sea at the 
north and at the west, or on the opposite side ex- 
tending to the South Sea. And I declare to all 
the people inhabiting this wide country that they 
now become vassals of His Majesty, and bound to 
obey his laws and follow his customs. He will 
protect them against all enemies. In his name I 
declare to all other princes and sovereigns and 
potentates of whatever rank, — and I warn their 
subjects, — that they are denied forever seizing 
upon or settling within the limits set by these 
seas ; except it be the pleasure of His Most 
Christian Majesty, and of him who shall govern 
in his behalf; and this on pain of incurring his 
resentment and the efforts of his arms. Long 
live the King ! " 

As the last words fell from his lips the French- 



The Pageant of Saint Lusson 45 

men responded with a loud shout, " Vive le Roi ! 
Long live the King ! " ; guns were fired, and the 
Indians shouted and yelped with delight. " The 
astonishment and delight of those people," says 
the chronicler, knew no bounds, " for they had 
never seen anything of the kind." If words and 
the planting of symbols could do it, the king of 
France had taken possession of the continent of 
North America, extending his dominion to the 
shores of seas of which he had no knowledge. 
But the dream of the French was not fulfilled. 
To-day a rival people, which then occupied only 
a small strip of the Atlantic seaboard, has swept 
away almost every trace of the empire thus pro- 
claimed. 

In order to impress upon the Indians more 
clearly the meaning of this august ceremony. 
Father Claude Allouez had been appointed to set 
forth the glory of the monarch to whom they 
were that day submitting themselves. He had 
spent many hours listening to flowery Indian 
harangues, and was familiar with the style of 
speech which suited their comprehension and met 
with their approval. What the Indians gathered 
from his curious address we do not know. After 
reading the part of it which has been preserved 



46 The Story of the Great Lakes 

we cannot wonder that, as the record tells, "they 
had no words with which to express their 
thoughts." 

As soon as the wild uproar of shouts and mus- 
ketry was hushed Father Allouez stepped forward 
on a slight eminence and began his speech. With 
a few words he dismissed the usual subject of his 
priestly discourses, the cross and its significance, 
and turned to the other post on which, as he ex- 
plained to them, were fastened the armorial bear- 
ings of the great " Captain of France." To him 
all the captains whom they had seen were mere 
children, or little herbs which one tramples under- 
foot as compared to a great tree. Even Onontio, 
— the governor of New France, — whose name 
was a daily terror to that mighty nation, the 
Iroquois, was but one of ten thousand captains 
who lived beyond the seas. When this great 
captain said, " I am going to war," all obeyed 
him. Those ten thousand captains raised com- 
panies of a hundred warriors each, disposing them 
according to his orders, on sea or land. Those 
who were needed at sea embarked on great ships 
which 'held four or five hundred or even a thou- 
sand men, while their Indian canoes held only four 
or five, or at best ten or twelve. Thus did this 



The Pageant of Saint Lusson 47 

king with his vast numbers of followers prepare 
for war, and when he came to attacking the enemy 
he was more terrible than thunder, and the earth 
trembled beneath him, while air and sea were set 
on fire by the discharge of his cannon. He had 
been seen in the midst of his warriors covered 
with the blood of his enemies whom he killed in 
such numbers that he set flowing rivers of blood. 
But all this was now long past. No one dared 
to make war on him ; all nations had submitted 
to him and begged humbly for peace. 

In this warlike guise Father Allouez presented 
Louis XIV till the Indian admiration was fully 
aroused and all were " astonished to hear that 
there was any man on earth so great and rich and 
powerful." 

The day closed with a " fine bonfire,'* lighted 
toward evening, around which the Frenchmen 
sang the " Te Deum," thanking God on behalf 
of " those poor peoples," who did not know 
enough to do it for themselves, — that they were 
the subjects of so great and powerful a monarch. 
The Indians departed to their homes, traders 
and coureurs de bois disappeared into the forests, 
the Jesuits returned to their self-sacrificing life 
of ministry, and adventurous French pioneers set 



48 The Story of the Great Lakes 

out across lake and wood to explore and claim 
the vast wilderness thus appropriated by France. 
The pageant of Saint Lusson was over, and Sault 
Ste. Marie relapsed into its usual life ; but thus 
early in the history of the Great Lakes this place 
had been singled out as a strategic spot. 



CHAPTER V 

THE BUILDING OF THE GRIFFON 

THE next noteworthy event in the story 
of the Great Lakes is the building and 
the launching of the Griffon, and the 
voyage of La Salle from the Niagara River to 
the southern end of Lake Michigan. Robert 
Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle, or La Salle as he is 
usually called, came to Canada in 1666, when 
he was three or four and thirty years of age. 
Outwardly cold and reserved, he was inwardly 
consumed with a burning desire for adventure. 
After his arrival, he set to work to study the 
Indian languages, in which he soon became pro- 
ficient ; and it was his delight to invite Indians to 
his cabin, and to draw from them tales of the far- 
off regions in which they dwelt, and especially of 
those wonderful rivers, the Ohio and the Missis- 
sippi, by the exploration of which he hoped to 
provide a new passage to China and Japan. An 
exploring trip which he took in 1669 gave him 
E 49 



50 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the practical experience which was later to be of 
value. La Salle was a man of strong prejudices 
and personal dislikes, who took little pains to 
overcome the jealousy of those who were envious 
of him ; but he gained one strong friend and 
patron, Count Frontenac, the governor of New 
France, who recognized a kindred spirit in this 
bold, enterprising young man. 

To a person of La Salle's disposition, the lands 
to the south of the Great Lakes offered alluring 
prospects of immediate gain. Instead of the bar- 
ren soil, gloomy forests, and harsh climate of the 
lower St. Lawrence Valley, this new country was 
largely open and abundantly supplied with mead- 
ows, brooks, and rivers. The soil was so fertile 
that everything which could be produced in 
France could be easily raised, and there was an 
abundance of fish, game, and venison. Colonists 
would find it easy to supply their own needs, and 
could engage in profitable cattle raising, for flocks 
and herds could be left out all winter. La Salle 
also reported that there was a species of native 
wild cattle, called the buffalo, whose wool was 
better than that of any sheep in France. He 
sought Louis XIV, king of France, and asked 
permission to found colonies and to conduct the 



The Building of the Griffon 51 

fur trade and explorations on the regions border- 
ing on the Great Lakes. The French king did 
not wish to found new colonies, for those already 
in existence had proved very expensive, but he 
was willing that La Salle should " labor at the 
discovery of the western parts of New France," 
provided that he pay all the expenses of the 
enterprise himself, and bring the matter to a 
conclusion within five years. With this permis- 
sion and such money as he could raise, La Salle 
returned to New France, and in the autumn of 
1678 set out to put his plans into execution. 
Detailed and interesting reports of his voyage on 
the waters of the Great Lakes have been preserved 
in the entertaining account of the journey which 
was written by Father Louis Hennepin, an adven- 
turous missionary who delighted in telling stories 
about himself and his doings. He was also some- 
thing of a prophet in foreseeing the time when 
there would be an " inconceivable commerce " on 
the Great Lakes, and their shores would be lined 
with the shops and dwellings of the whites. 

Up to this time the French missionaries and 
the fur traders had gained the interior by way of 
the Ottawa River, or the Toronto, and Georgian 
Bay. La Salle decided to build a sailing-vessel 



52 The Story of the Great Lakes 

on the shore of Lake Erie, in which he could 
transport his men to the stations he intended to 
establish, and also carry his trading goods to the 
Indians, and bring back the furs which he obtained 
in exchange for them. He already had a fortified 
post at Fort Frontenac on the northeastern shore 
of Lake Ontario ; but he could not build his ship 
at this point, because the natives told him that 
formidable cataracts interrupted the navigation 
between Lakes Ontario and Erie. He sent an 
advance company to establish a station at the 
head of Lake Ontario, and to seek a convenient 
site on Lake Erie for the construction of the ship. 
With this expedition went Father Hennepin, 
whose graphic account of what he saw and of 
what he experienced is one of the most interest- 
ing in the annals of American exploration. The 
voyagers reached the mouth of the Niagara River 
in safety. When the current became too strong 
for them to go farther in their canoe, they landed 
and pushed forward through the snow. As they 
made their way along the edge of the river, they 
heard more and more clearly the roar of falling 
waters ; and, at length, there burst upon their 
sight the falls of Niagara, or the " Thunder of 
Waters," as the Indians called it, — that "vast 



The Building of the Griffon k^^^ 

and prodigious cadence of water which falls down 
after a surprising and astonishing manner, inso- 
much that the universe does not afford its parallel, 
those of Italy and Switzerland being but sorry- 
patterns." Hennepin describes this wonderful 
cataract as made up of two great cross-streams 
of water and two falls with an island between, and 
declares that when this " prodigious quantity " of 
water comes to fall, there is a din and a noise 
more deafening than the loudest thunder ; the 
rebound of the waters was so great that a cloud 
arose from the foam and hung over the abyss, 
even when the sun was at its height. He could 
not say enough of this " most beautiful, and at 
the same time most frightful cascade " which he 
saw for the first time on this December day in 
1678.1 

While Hennepin and his party were exploring 
the Niagara, La Motte, the leader of the expedi- 

1 Lake Ontario is 326 ft. lower than Lake Erie and about 30 miles distant. 
For 1 8 miles the Niagara River flows peacefully along, then suddenly the chan- 
nel narrows and the waters rush down 5 3 ft. in half a mile, and then drop over 
a clifF 1 60 ft. in two separate falls, one 600 and the other 200 ft. wide. Seven 
thousand tons of water are thus discharged every second into a narrow gorge 
whose nearly perpendicular walls rise 2.00 ft. on either side, Down its steep 
slope the imprisoned waters dash in a succession of boiling rapids, white with 
foam, forming in one loop of the channel a curious whirlpool. Issuing ft'om 
this gorge at Lewiston, the river flows tranquilly on to Lake Ontario. 



54 The Story of the Great Lakes 

tion, had selected a site for a fortified house about 
two leagues above the mouth of the river and not 
far from the present town of Lewiston. He set 
his laborers to work, but their task was hard, be- 
cause the frozen ground had to be thawed with 
boiling water before it was possible to drive down 
stakes for a palisade. As the carpenters labored 
at their tasks, distrustful and jealous Indians from 
a neighboring Seneca village of the Iroquois loi- 
tered about, watching them with sullen looks, and 
intimated in a way that could not be disregarded 
their unwillingness to allow the work to go on. 
And well they might ! Niagara was the key to 
the four upper lakes from which the Iroquois fur 
trade could be controlled, and this fort was being 
built expressly to hold in check those vigorous 
tribes, and put an end to their trade with the 
English and the Dutch in the furs which they 
obtained from the Indians of the western terri- 
tory. La Salle had realized that difficulty would 
probably arise, and had instructed La Motte to go 
to the great village of the Senecas and endeavor to 
gain their consent to the French plans for build- 
ing the fort and the ship. This La Motte now 
decided to do. After five days' journey through 
the snowy forests, he and his companions reached 



The Building of the Griffon 55 

the town which was beyond the Genesee and 
southeast of Rochester, not far from the present 
town of Victor, New York. The weary travellers 
were conducted to the wigwam of the principal 
chief, where women and children flocked to gaze 
upon the whites. An old man, according to cus- 
tom, went through the village announcing their 
arrival, and younger savages washed their feet 
and then rubbed them with bear's grease. 

The next afternoon. La Motte was summoned 
to confer with forty-two old men who made up 
the Indian council. These chiefs, clad in robes 
of beaver, wolf, or black squirrel, squatted upon 
the ground ; but, writes Hennepin, " the senators 
of Venice do not appear with a graver counte- 
nance and perhaps do not speak with more maj- 
esty and solidity than these ancient Iroquois." 
La Motte's interpreter harangued the assembly, 
stating that the French wished to build a great 
wooden canoe and to erect a fort on the banks 
of the Niagara River. He endeavored to con- 
vince the natives that this enterprise would be for 
their advantage, as it would enable the French to 
sell them goods at lower prices than the Dutch 
and English traders. He enforced every reason 
with wampum belts, and gifts of axes, knives. 



^6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

coats, and scarlet cloth, — for the best arguments 
in the world were not listened to by the Indians 
unless accompanied by presents. The shrewd, 
savage politicians received the gifts, but were not 
convinced. Their replies were general and eva- 
sive and gave no satisfaction. When the council 
was over, they proceded to torture an Indian 
prisoner, and La Motte with his men left the 
camp in disgust to go back and await the arrival 
of La Salle from Fort Frontenac. La Salle and 
Tonty, his ever faithful friend and follower, with 
men and supplies for the expedition arrived at 
the Seneca town not long after the departure of 
La Motte and his men. La Salle succeeded in 
" so dexterously gaining their affection " that the 
Indians consented to permit him to carry arms 
and ammunition by the Niagara portage, to build 
a vessel above the cataract, and to establish a 
fortified warehouse at the mouth of the river. 
Armed with this permission, he proceeded to the 
encampment of La Motte. The rejoicing at this 
success was short lived, for a few days later report 
came that a vessel which La Salle had left at the 
mouth of the Genesee River had been ship- 
wrecked on the southern shore of Lake Ontario. 
Of all the equipment for his enterprise with which 



The Building of the Griffon 57 

this vessel was laden, only the anchors and cables 
for the new ship were saved ; but La Salle with 
his unvarying fortitude went on with the work 
as if nothing had happened. 

La Salle selected a spot on the banks of the 
Niagara River above the falls at the mouth of 
what is now called Cayuga Creek, where the water 
was quiet, being sheltered by an island from the 
current of the river — a little village near that 
spot still bears his name. Hither the little com- 
pany of thirty men, heavily laden with tools and 
provisions, journeyed laboriously through the 
snow on one of the last days of January, 1679. 
Two Mohegan hunters, who were with the party, 
set about making bark wigwams for the men and 
a chapel for Father Hennepin, who had travelled 
the twelve miles with his portable altar lashed 
to his back. The ship carpenters went to work 
at once, and in four days the keel of the vessel 
was ready. La Salle invited Father Hennepin 
to drive the first bolt, " but the modesty of my 
religious profession,*' he says, "compelled me to 
decline this honor." So La Salle himself drove 
the first nail in the ship. 

Fortunately the majority of the Iroquois war- 
riors had gone on the war-path beyond Lake 



58 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Erie ; but although those who had remained at J 
home were less insolent because of the absence 
of the rest, yet they did not fail to visit the ship- 
yard frequently, loitering sullenly about and ex- 
hibiting their displeasure. One of them, pre- 
tending to be drunk, attacked the blacksmith, 
and tried to kill him ; but the blacksmith vigor- 
ously defended himself with a red-hot bar of iron. 
This, together with the severity of the reprimand 
administered by Father Hennepin, who always 
represents himself as indispensable on every occa- 
sion, induced the savages to depart for the mo- 
ment. The work went rapidly on, and as the 
great " wooden canoe '* began to show its propor- 
tions the Indians became more and more alarmed. 
A few days later a squaw told the French that 
they meant to burn the vessel on the stocks, and 
had not a very close watch been kept they would 
undoubtedly have done so. 

These frequent alarms, the steady cold, and 
the shortage of supplies owing to the loss of La 
Salle's vessel and the enmity of the Iroquois, 
who refused to sell them food, discouraged the 
shipbuilders. They would certainly have de- 
serted had not La Salle and Hennepin taken 
great pains to reassure and cheer them on. 



The Building of the Griffon 59 

Toward spring La Salle set out on foot for Fort 
Frontenac to procure food and supplies and to 
attend to his personal affairs. His presence was 
needed there because his enemies had persuaded 
his creditors that the undertaking was a rash one, 
and had instigated them to seize all his goods, 
although Fort Frontenac alone was more than 
sufficient to pay his debts. During La Sailers 
absence from Niagara one of the workmen en- 
deavored to stir up the others to desert. " This 
bad man," announces Hennepin, "would infal- 
libly have perverted our carpenters, had not I 
confirmed them in their good resolution by the 
exhortations I made them after divine service." 

The Mohegan hunters brought in deer and 
other game, warmer weather arrived, and cheer- 
fulness once more prevailed. The shipbuilders 
went on with their work more briskly, and in the 
early spring of 1679, before La Salle returned, 
the vessel was ready to be launched. Father 
Hennepin blessed the ship and christened it the 
Griffon^ for on the prow La Salle had placed a 
roughly carved figure of this mythical monster, 
taken from the coat of arms of Count Frontenac. 
The assembled company sang a hymn of praise ; 
three cannon were fired ; and amid loud acclama- 



6o The Story of the Great Lakes 

tions from both French and Indians, the Griffon 
ghded into the Niagara River. All haste had 
been made to get her afloat, even before she was 
entirely completed, to save her from the plots of 
the Indians, who were determined to burn her. 
But the men did not wait for her to be finished 
to put her to use. They immediately quitted 
their bark wigwams, swung their hammocks 
under her decks, and that very night, rejoicing in 
their security from the Indians, all slept soundly 
on board the ship. 

The Iroquois warriors, returning from a hunt- 
ing trip, were mightily surprised to see the vessel 
afloat, and shouted, " Otkon ! Otkon ! '* which 
means " most penetrating wits," to the triumphant 
Frenchmen. For they could not understand how 
in so short a time the white men could build 
so large a canoe, — although the craft was of 
only about forty-five tons. With her five cannon 
she was to the savages a wonderful moving for- 
tress, and inspired in them a wholesome fear and 
admiration for the French. 



CHAPTER VI 

LA SALLE ON THE GREAT LAKES 

IN the summer of 1679, La Salle returned 
from Fort Frontenac to Niagara to find the 
Griffon finished and ready for her first 
voyage. By the completion of this vessel his 
enterprise was fairly launched. Behind him at 
Montreal were enemies and creditors ; before 
him stretched the waters of the Great Lakes, and 
beyond was the unexplored wilderness. The men 
had been unable to sail the Griffon up the Niagara 
River to the mouth of Lake Erie because of the 
strong adverse current. Now, with the help of 
a strong wind and with tow-ropes in the most 
difficult places. La Salle brought the vessel 
through the turbulent water to the calm outlet of 
the lake. There the crew celebrated their safe 
passage with religious services and cannonading 
and then set sail on the unknown waters. 

To deter his men from the voyage, La Salle's 
enemies had declared that the lake was full of 

61 



62 The Story of the Great Lakes 

rocks and sands. For the first day and night, 
therefore, the men kept their sounding-lines busy, 
but navigation proved to be easy. On the fourth 
day after leaving Niagara, they reached the mouth 
of that wide river called by the French " The 
Strait," — Detroit. Here the current was so 
strong that they came to anchor to wait for a 
favorable breeze. Soon a brisk wind arose 
and the Griffon ploughed her way through the 
rapids between Grosse Isle and the mainland, 
pioneer of the mighty vessels which to-day make 
that strait one of the great commercial highways 
of the world. On both sides stretched fine open 
fields dotted with fruit trees, and walnut and 
chestnut groves, and beyond in the distance were 
lofty forests. All were " so well-disposed,** says 
Hennepin, "that one would think Nature alone 
without the help of art could not have made so 
charming a prospect.'* Flocks of turkeys and 
swans circled about, and from the deck of the 
ship herds of deer could be seen roaming the 
meadows. The Griffon was soon well stocked 
with meat, and the returning hunters united in 
heaping praises on this beautiful spot where fruit 
and game of every kind abounded, and where 
even the bears were not so savage as in other 



La Salle on the Great Lakes 6^ 

places. Hennepin urged La Salle to make a 
settlement on this " charming strait," but La 
Salle coldly reminded him of the great passion 
which he had professed a few months before for 
the discovery of a new country, and the priest 
was silenced. Amid the later hardships of the 
journey all must have looked longingly back 
to this time of ease and plenty at the strait of 
Detroit. 

On the 1 2th of August, the Griffon passed 
by the site of the present city of Detroit. Had 
they come here ten years before, the explorers 
would have found on the bank of the river a 
large stone, rudely fashioned in the likeness of a 
human figure and bedaubed with paint, which 
the Indians worshipped as a manito, or god. 
But in 1670 French priests, making the first 
recorded passage through the strait, had come 
upon this image, and "full of hatred for this 
false deity," had fallen upon it with their axes, 
breaking it in pieces and casting it into the water. 
Beyond Detroit the river widened into a beau- 
tiful little sheet of water. As it was St. Claire's 
day, Hennepin's proposal that the name of the 
founder of his order be given to this lake was 
carried out, and it received its present name. 



64 The Story of the Great Lakes 

When the Griffon had crossed the lake, the 
men saw before them wide marshes through which 
the swift-moving river had many a winding chan- 
nel. They had come to the St. Clair Flats, a 
fan-shaped delta of seven channels, on which has 
been built to-day a popular summer resort. They 
set to work sounding one passage after another, 
only to find them shallow and almost barred with 
shoals. But at last they came upon an excellent 
channel about a league broad, with no sands and 
a depth everywhere of from three to eight fath- 
oms of water through which the vessel sailed 
easily toward Lake Huron. At the mouth of 
the river, however, they were forced to drop 
anchor and remain for several days. A north 
wind had been blowing, driving the water of the 
three upper lakes into the strait. This had in- 
creased so much the usual force of the current 
that it was as violent as that of the Niagara, and 
entirely impassable for a vessel like the Gnffon. 
Even when the wind turned southerly. La Salle 
could make no headway against this current until 
he sent ashore a dozen men who hauled and 
towed the vessel along the beach for half an 
hour, dragging her out of the narrow mouth of 
the channel into the wave-tossed waters of the 



La Salle on the Great Lakes 65 

lake. Once more all returned "thanks to the 
Almighty for their happy navigation/' and set 
sail on the 23d of August on Lake Huron. 

The favoring winds soon died down, and La 
Salle lay becalmed for two days among the is- 
lands of Thunder Bay. Starting from there at 
noon on his way northward, he was caught in a 
furious westerly gale. For hours the little vessel 
tossed and drifted over the raging waters of the 
lake, lying at the mercy of wind and wave. 
Even La Salle gave up hope and told his men 
to prepare for death. All fell on their knees 
except the pilot, who devoted the time instead 
to cursing and swearing against his employer for 
having brought him there to perish in a " nasty 
lake, and lose the glory he had acquired by long 
and happy navigations on the ocean." But Pilot 
Lucas and his brave commander were not des- 
tined to perish in that storm. Hennepin vowed 
an altar to St. Anthony of Padua, prudently 
agreeing to set it up in Louisiana if they should 
reach there. The storm-clouds rolled away, the 
waters grew quiet, and the sun shone out on the 
wooded cliffs of the islands of Bois Blanc and 
Mackinac, and the dense forests of Michigan. 
The vessel anchored behind the point of St. 



66 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Ignace, in the harbor of Mich ill mackinac, the 
settlement which was at once the centre of Jesuit 
missions and of Indian traders. 

The sound of the Griffon s cannon brought out a 
varied throng from the wigwams and cabins on 
shore. Shouting Indians gazed with wonder at 
this huge wooden canoe ; lawless French traders, 
swarthy from long years in the wilderness, to 
whom the distance of this trading post from 
civilization was its strongest recommendation, 
lounged idly out of their cabins, gazing with 
resentment at this invader of their trade and 
country ; while black-robed Jesuit priests hurried 
to the shore to welcome the newcomers. Indians, 
traders, and Jesuits united in a show of welcome 
to La Salle as he landed, finely dressed and 
wearing a scarlet cloak bordered with broad gold 
lace. All marched to the little bark chapel in 
the Ottawa village, and united with the voyagers 
in hearing mass and giving thanks for their safe 
passage. 

At this settlement La Salle found four of fifteen 
men whom he had sent ahead the autumn before 
to buy furs, and to go to the tribes along the 
Illinois River, making preparations for his com- 
ing. Most of these men had been enticed from 



La Salle on the Great Lakes 67 

his service, and had wasted the goods given them 
to exchange for furs, using them for their own 
personal gain. Troubled over his affairs in 
Canada La Salle had meant to return from this 
point to Montreal, leaving Tonty to conduct his 
party to the IlHnois River. But he soon felt the 
hostile spirit at the trading post, and realized 
that his presence was necessary to keep his men 
from being drawn away. Even the swarms of 
Indians who hovered in their canoes about the 
vessel regarded it with wonder and jealousy rather 
than friendliness, and La Salle feared that the 
Illinois tribes would be tampered with by his 
enemies. 

He determined to push on at once, and em- 
barked early in September. The vessel pro- 
ceeded across Lake Michigan, called by the 
French and Indians Lake Illinois from the name 
of the tribes who inhabited its southern shores, 
and cast anchor at the entrance of Green Bay. 
Here matters took a turn for the better. As the 
vessel lay tossing about behind a point of the 
bay, an Indian chief came out in his canoe to 
greet the Frenchmen. When he learned that 
La Salle was a friend of Count Frontenac and 
bore his commission, the Indian told him of his 



68 The Story of the Great Lakes 

own warm friendship for Frontenac, for whom he 
would gladly lay down his life, and welcomed La 
Salle with the greatest cordiality. He reported, 
too, the presence of Frenchmen near by, and La 
Salle found the faithful remnant of his advance 
party waiting with a cargo of furs which they had ^ 
collected. Eager to satisfy his clamorous credit- 
ors, he determined to send back the Griffon, in 
charge of the pilot and five men, with this load 
of furs. On the i8th of September, the Griffon 
fired a parting shot and started for Niagara, to 
return as soon as she had discharged her 
cargo ; and La Salle, with Hennepin and four- 
teen others, embarked in four canoes for the 
south. 

The canoes had hardly started when a sudden 
September storm swept across the lake. The 
waves washed into the heavily laden canoes, dark- 
ness fell, and it was only by constant shouting 
that the men kept their boats together and got 
to shore. For four days the storm raged with 
unabated fury. As La Salle and his men waited 
from day to day in their cheerless encampment, 
living on pumpkins and Indian corn presented 
them by the friendly Indian chief and the meat 
of a single porcupine brought in by a hunter, the 



La Salle on the Great Lakes 69 

thought of the Griffon haunted them. Their 
worst fears proved afterward to have been ful- 
filled ; she was never heard of again. With her 
sank the cargo which was to have restored La 
Salle's credit in Montreal ; and with her, too, 
perished the high hopes that had been set upon 
this first vessel on the upper lakes. 

Although La Salle feared the worst, he did 
not turn back. As soon as the lake grew calm 
the four canoes set out again, coasting southward 
along the shore of Wisconsin. But the elements 
were against them. Storm after storm drove 
them ashore, where they spent wretched days and 
nights among the rocks and bushes, crouched 
around driftwood fires with nothing to shelter 
them from snow and rain but their blankets. As 
they went southward, steep, high bluffs ran so 
close to the lake that it was hard to find a 
landing-place. Yet the violence of the wind was 
so great that they were compelled at evening to 
drag their canoes to the top of the bluffs in order 
not to leave them exposed all night to the waves 
which would have dashed them to pieces. In 
the morning, in order to reembark, two men had 
to go into the water to the waist and hold a 
canoe upright until it was loaded, pushing it out 



70 The Story of the Great Lakes 

or drawing it back as the waves advanced or 
retreated. Food gave out and the men paddled 
from morning till night with nothing to eat but 
a daily handful of Indian corn and hawthorn ber- 
ries which they picked on shore and devoured 
so ravenously that they made them ill. Exhaus- 
tion and famine stared them in the face, but relief 
was in sight. 

One morning as the men were paddling along 
near the site of Milwaukee, they saw upon the 
shore a cloud of ravens and eagles hovering over 
something. They hastened on land and found 
the body of a deer which had been killed by a 
wolf. This was the beginning of better things. 
As the little fleet advanced toward the south, they 
found the country ever fairer and the weather 
more temperate. There was an abundance of 
game, of which there had hitherto been an excep- 
tional lack. They passed the Chicago River and 
circled the end of the lake, landing at the mouth 
of the St. Joseph. Here La Salle waited for 
Tonty to join them, employing the time in build- 
ing a fort. On the third of December the party 
sailed up the river, bound for the villages of the 
Illinois. On a later trip in 1682 La Salle reached 
the Illinois settlements by a shorter route, cross- 



La Salle on the Great Lakes 71 

ing from his fort to the river Chicago, and jour- 
neying from its waters into a northern branch of 
the Illinois River. 

In four months La Salle had traversed the 
length of Lake Erie, had passed through the 
strait of Detroit, up Lake Huron, through 
the Straits of Mackinac, and down Lake Michi- 
gan ; from the sites of Buffalo and Cleveland he 
had sailed past Detroit and Milwaukee even to 
Chicago, and had then journeyed inland to the 
IlHnpis River. He had lost his vessel and her 
crew, as well as all his furs ; he had met 
with hostility from French and Indian alike ; he 
had been deserted by most of his advance party, 
and had held his own crew only by his presence 
and the dominating force of his personality ; he 
had suffered endless hardships and privations : 
but nothing had shaken his purpose. In later 
years he followed the Illinois and the Mississippi to 
the Gulf of Mexico and led a colony to the limits 
of the present state of Texas, where he was mur- 
dered by one of his men. In history. La Salle 
stands out as a man whose courage and persever- 
ing fortitude in the face of almost insuperable 
obstacles mark him as one of the greatest explorers 
the world has ever known. We do well to join 



72 The Story of the Great Lakes 

with Hennepin in saying, " Those who shall be 
so happy as to inhabit that noble country cannot 
but remember with gratitude those who discovered 
the way by venturing to sail upon unknown 
lakes." 



CHAPTER VII 

A HAPLESS FRENCH GOVERNOR 

LIKE all strong men Frontenac made 
many enemies. He was recalled in 1682, 
and General La Barre, a man of about 
sixty, was sent out in his place. La Barre had 
made a good record in the West Indies, but was 
entirely unable to handle the difficult problems 
which met him in New France. In an evil hour 
for the French, the Iroquois had conquered the 
southern neighbors with whom they had long 
waged wars that had occupied much of their time 
and strength. Now, they were free to turn on 
the Indian allies of Canada of whose commercial 
gains through the fur trade with the French they 
had long been envious. Frontenac before his de- 
parture had found the Iroquois unusually arrogant 
and unruly, although they had come to regard 
him as the greatest of all " Onontios," as they 
named the governors of New France. The 
Dutch and the English had meanwhile made 

73 



74 The Story of the Great Lakes 

more or less successful advances to the Iroquois, 
who now fully realized their own importance 
from the efforts of both French and English to 
gain their support. 

For two years La Barre struggled on, entan- 
gling rather than helping the situation. At length 
an Iroquois chief was murdered in a village of 
French Indians, and the crisis came. In the early 
spring of 1684, French canoes were plundered by 
the Senecas and La Barre felt that he must assert 
his power, or the Indians would lose their respect 
for the French. After making great preparations, 
he started with his soldiers and frontiersmen for 
the Seneca country by way of the St. Lawrence 
to Fort Frontenac and thence across Lake On- 
tario. The opposing current of the river was so 
strong that frequently the men could make no 
progress by paddling, but were obliged to tow the 
canoes or push them along with poles. Every 
few miles were rapids around which the canoes 
were transported and through which the flatboats 
were pulled with the greatest effort. The mos- 
quitoes were " insufferably troublesome,*' hovering 
over the men in such clouds that they could 
hardly see their way, — so one of the soldiers 
wrote. At Fort Frontenac, the men fell ill of a 



A Hapless French Governor 75 

malarial fever which killed many and disabled 
more. La Barre repented more than once of 
entering upon an expedition that he now saw 
would be disastrous. 

Whatever his former warlike purposes, La 
Barre was now eager for peace. He sent Le 
Moyne, a veteran interpreter whom the Iroquois 
called the " Partridge," to the Onondagas asking 
them to meet him on the southern side of the 
lake, twenty miles or so north of Oswego. Le 
Moyne returned in a few days with the famous 
Onondaga chief, " Big Mouth " ; in French this 
is " La Grande Gueule," which the soldiers short- 
ened into " Grangula." Big Mouth had recently 
been conferring with the English, whose arbitrary 
demands had offended his pride ; he was now in 
a haughty mood that boded ill for the French. 

The Indian chief was accompanied by a train 
of thirty young warriors. As soon as he disem- 
barked. General La Barre sent him a present of 
bread and wine, and thirty salmon-trouts. At 
the same time he gave him to understand that 
he was pleased at his arrival, and would be glad 
to have an interview with him after he had rested 
himself. To conceal from Big Mouth the weak- 
ness of the French forces Le Moyne represented 



76 The Story of the Great Lakes 

to him that the most of the soldiers had been left 
behind at Fort Frontenac, and that the troops 
which he saw were the general's guards ; but one 
of the Iroquois knew a little of the French tongue. 
Strolling noiselessly about the tents by night he 
overheard the talk of the soldiers and learned the 
true state of affairs. 

It was two days after his arrival before Big 
Mouth gave notice to La Barre that he was ready 
for an interview. The council was held on an 
open spot between the two encampments. From 
the picture drawn by one of the French soldiers 
we see the arrangement. La Barre was seated in 
state in an armchair with his Jesuit interpreter 
beside him and the French officers ranged on his 
right and left. The two lines of French soldiers 
formed two more sides of the square. Opposite 
La Barre sat the Indians with Big Mouth, their 
spokesman, in front, and between them in the 
centre of the square was placed the great Calumet 
or Pipe of Peace. The stem of this huge pipe 
was about four feet long, and the body or bowl 
about eight inches high. The bowl was of hand- 
some red stone, well polished, and the stem of 
a strong reed or cane, trimmed with yellow, white, 
and green feathers. In shape it resembled a huge 




La Barre and Grangula 



A Hapless French Governor 77 

hammer more than anything else. The Indians 
used these calumets for negotiations as we use a 
flag of truce, holding them peculiarly sacred. To 
violate the rights of this venerable pipe was re- 
garded among them as a flaming crime that would 
draw down mischief upon their nations. About 
this calumet were piled the wampum belts to be 
presented by the speakers. 

La Barre opened the council, speaking boldly 
and with apparent assurance. He made no al- 
lusion to his original purpose of making war on 
the Senecas, but announced that the king, his 
master, had sent him there with a guard to meet 
the principal chiefs of the Five Nations at an 
appointed council fire. The Five Nations had 
made infractions upon the peace concluded be- 
tween them and the French. Should Big Mouth 
be willing, as their representative, to make rep- 
aration and offer promises for the future, the 
great French monarch desired that La Barre and 
Big Mouth should smoke together the calumet 
of peace. 

La Barre recounted the three offences of the 
Iroquois. They had robbed and ill-used French 
traders ; for this he demanded reparation. They 
had brought the English to the lakes which be- 



yS The Story of the Great Lakes 

longed to the French, thus diverting trade from 
the latter ; this he would forget, provided it did 
not happen again. They had attacked the Illinois, 
and still held many in captivity. " These people 
are my master's children," said La Barre, " and 
must therefore cease to be your slaves." They 
must be sent home at once. He enforced each 
statement with a wampum belt, and ended every 
request with an announcement, as bold as though 
he had the whole French army at his back, that 
should these demands not be complied with, he 
" had express orders to declare war," even going 
so far once as to say, " in case of your refusal, 
war is positively proclaimed." He would gladly 
leave them in peace, should they prove "religious 
observers of the treaties," but if not he added, 
concluding with a statement which he knew to be 
false, he would be obliged to join the governor of 
New York, who had orders from his king to 
assist La Barre in burning the five villages and 
cutting off the Iroquois. 

While La Barre's interpreter translated this 
speech, Grangula sat silent and attentive, gazing 
steadily at the bowl of his pipe. After the ha- 
rangue was finished he rose and walked round 
inside the square made by the French and savages, 



A Hapless French Governor 79 

five or six times. Then he returned to his place, 
and drawing himself to his full height began to 
speak. " Onontio, I honor you," he said, " and 
all the warriors that accompany me do the same. 
Your interpreter has made an end of his discourse, 
and now I come to begin mine. My voice glides 
to your ear, pray listen to my words." 

He thought that the French captain must have 
started out from Quebec with some strange idea 
that the Five Nations had been wiped out by fire 
or flood. Nothing else, he implied, could make 
him set out against so powerful a federation with 
such an army. The Indian chief ironically as- 
sured the French general of the continued pros- 
perity of the Five Nations, congratulating him 
that he brought the calumet of peace, rather than 
the bloody axe that had been so often dyed with 
the blood of the French. Then he spoke out 
boldly and directly, telling La Barre that he knew 
better than to believe the Frenchman's pretence 
that he did not have any other purpose in ap- 
proaching the lake than to smoke the pipe of 
peace with the Onondagas. He saw plainly that 
the Onontio meant to "knock them on the head," 
if the French arms had not been so much weak- 
ened. The French soldiers were to be congratu- 



8o The Story of the Great Lakes 

lated that the Great Spirit had visited them with 
sickness, for only thus had their lives been saved 
from Indian massacre. Even the women and 
old men and children would have attacked the 
French camp without fear, had not Akouessan 
(Le Moyne) appeared at the Onondaga village 
announcing that he was an ambassador of peace, 
not of war. 

With this bold and telling introduction, in 
which he revealed to the French his full compre- 
hension of their weakness and of their deceit, Big 
Mouth proceeded to consider the accusations of 
La Barre. The pillage of French traders he justi- 
fied on the ground that they were carrying arms 
to the Illinois, and for this he flatly refused to 
give satisfaction, declaring insultingly that even 
the old men of his tribe had long ceased to fear 
the French. They had conducted the English to 
the lakes to traffic with French allies, just as the 
Algonquins conducted the French to the Five 
Nations to trade with them. Moreover, he 
claimed that they had a perfect right to do as 
they pleased in this matter. " We are born free- 
men," he declared proudly, "and have no de- 
pendence either upon the Onontio [governor of 
Canada], or the Corker [governor of New York] . 



A Hapless French Governor 8i 

We have power to go where we please, to con- 
duct whoever we will to the places we resort to, 
and to buy and sell where we think fit." If the 
French chose they might make slaves of their 
allies, robbing them of the liberty of entertaining 
any other Indians, but the Five Nations would 
brook no such interference. The Iroquois at- 
tacked the Illinois because they invaded their 
territory, hunting beavers on their lands. Big 
Mouth met the reproof of La Barre with a bold 
stroke in return. He declared that in defending 
their own lands against the Illinois they had done 
less than the English and French, who without 
any right, had usurped the grounds they now 
possessed, dislodging from them several nations 
in order to make way for the building of their 
cities, villages, and forts. 

Big Mouth closed his address with a warning. 
A year ago the hatchet had been buried in the 
presence of Count Frontenac at his fort, and the 
tree of peace had been planted. It was then stipu- 
lated that this fort should be used as a place of 
retreat for traders, and not a refuge for soldiers. 
Big Mouth warned the French to take care lest 
so great a number of soldiers as he now saw 
before him " stifle and choke the tree of peace," 



82 The Story of the Great Lakes 

and hinder it from shading both countries with 
its leaves. The Iroquois were ready to dance 
under its branches the dance of peace, and never 
dig up the hatchet to cut it down, unless the 
governors of Canada and New York, jointly or 
separately, should invade the country given by the 
Great Spirit to their ancestors. The Indian ora- 
tor presented two wampum belts and sat down. 

As soon as he had done, Le Moyne and the 
Jesuits interpreted his answer to La Barre, who 
thereupon retired to his tent and stormed and 
blustered till somebody came and represented to 
him that good manners were not to be expected 
from an Iroquois. It was little wonder that 
La Barre raged. The Indian chief had seen 
through his artifices, had yielded to none of his 
demands, and had contrived to assert the com- 
plete independence of his own tribes and their 
contempt for the French. 

Big Mouth entertained some of the French 
officers at a feast, which he opened for them by 
dancing an Indian dance. There was another 
council in the afternoon, and the terms of peace 
were settled upon in the evening. These terms 
were in the usual form of Indian treaties. A 
" word" of the Iroquois was answered by a "word" 



A Hapless French Governor 83 

of the French accepting it, and all disputed 
points were taken up in a series of such "words." 

The Iroquois offered to the French a beverage 
devoid of bitterness to purify whatever inconven- 
ience they had experienced on their voyage, and 
to dispel whatever bad air they had breathed 
between Montreal and this council fire, — a bev- 
erage of which the malarial French were certainly 
in dire need. They reminded the French of the 
deep ditch dug the year before, into which all 
unkind things that might occur were to be cast, 
and requested the French to throw into it the 
Seneca robbery, to which the French agreed. 
Again the tree of peace was set up, each side sol- 
emnly adjuring the other to sustain and strengthen 
it. The French agreed to depart at once, and 
then, — and not till then, — did the Iroquois con- 
sent to renew the former treaty, " dispelling all the 
clouds that had obscured the Sun from their sight." 

Thus ended the grand expedition of La Barre. 
No real satisfaction had been gained by the 
French, but a weak truce had been made, and 
the Iroquois had taken the opportunity to assert 
boldly their independence of French and English 
alike, whom they treated as invaders of their 
rightful possessions. 



84 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Big Mouth and his men returned to their 
homes, and the French set out for Montreal. 
The few healthy men that remained manned the 
General's canoes and took charge of the flat- 
bottomed boats in which the soldiers were carried. 
Of the dangers attendant on shooting the rapids 
in these boats one of the soldiers draws a vivid pic- 
ture, declaring that he and his companions wished 
themselves back in the canoes that had brought 
them up, when they shot down such precipices of 
water as had never been heard of before. The 
main current wound its way in and out past eddies 
and rocks, dashing along as fast as a cannon ball, 
and the men steered as well as they could along 
this zigzag course, knowing that a false stroke of 
the oar would send them upon the rocks. But in 
spite of the discomfort and the danger, this soldier 
confesses from the safe shelter of Montreal that, 
though the risk was very great, "yet, by way of 
compensation one had the satisfaction of running 
a great way in a very short time." And he closes 
with a word of sympathy for La Barre. "All the 
world blames our General for his bad success. . . . 
The people here are busy in wafting to court a 
thousand calumnies against him. . . . But after all 
the poor man could do no more than he did." 



PART II 
THE STRUGGLE FOR POSSESSION 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE FOUNDING OF DETROIT 

AFTER the failure which has been re- 
counted in the preceding chapter, La 
Barre was recalled to France, and a new 
governor, Denonville, sent over to take his place. 
He had not much greater success and was in turn 
replaced by Count Frontenac, who returned to 
the scene of his former labors. This was in 
1689, when England and France were at war. 
For the remaining nine years of his life Fron- 
tenac devoted all his energies to defending New 
France against the English and the Iroquois and 
to holding what the French had already gained 
on the Great Lakes. In November, 1698, in his 
seventy-eighth year, he died, and was deeply 
mourned as a strong governor and beloved 
leader. He had come out to New France in 
1672, and during his long term of service he had 
used his power and influence not only to build 
up the settlements on the St. Lawrence, but also 

87 



88 The Story of the Great Lakes 

to plant on the shores of the Great Lakes and 
the rivers beyond a line of French forts and trad- 
ing posts. He had gathered about him a group 
of young men who shared his enthusiasm for 
expansion and were eager to carry on his work. 
Five years before his death, Frontenac had sent 
one of his men, Cadillac, to the Straits of Mack- 
inac to hold that centre of the fur trade. 

Cadillac was a rough, forceful soldier who was 
summary in his methods and short in his speech. 
He was well suited to the command of a frontier 
post and did good work in keeping the lake 
Indians from alliance with the enemies of the 
French. He did not, however, get on well with 
the missionaries at Michilimackinac. They 
resented his presence and his influence with the 
Indians, for whose conversion to Christianity they 
were earnestly laboring. Cadillac soon came to 
see that Detroit and not Mackinac was the key 
to the interior. Whoever held the narrow 
channel connecting Lake Erie and Lake Huron 
would control the fur trade of the whole lake 
region. He hastened to Quebec to gain support 
for his scheme of erecting a fort and trading sta- 
tion on the Detroit River. There he was stoutly 
opposed by the Jesuits, who foresaw that the 



The Founding of Detroit 89 

carrying out of his project would mean the ruin 
of their mission, which could not compete com- 
mercially with the new station, and that the 
extension of trade would bring the vices of 
civilization to the natives. Nothing daunted, 
Cadillac went over the seas to France, gained 
the favor of the colonial minister, and returned 
to Canada with permission to found his colony. 
He reached Detroit with a band of one hundred 
colonists and soldiers on the 24th of July, 1701. 
Cadillac had done well in choosing Detroit as 
the situation for the first permanent colony on 
the lakes. In the century that was past the 
Great Lakes had been discovered and explored ; 
the eighteenth century was to witness their occu- 
pation and the contest for the possession of this 
rich country. In this long strife, first France 
and England, and then England and the Ameri- 
can colonies, were to come to blows, while always 
on these shores unceasing warfare would be 
waged between the advancing white man and the 
retreating red man. In the opening years of the 
new century Cadillac was taking the first step in 
permanent occupation of the country, planting 
his settlement on a site so important that a wise 
English leader was at that very time urging upon 



90 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the New York assembly its colonization by the 
English. So long as Lake Erie and Lake On- 
tario had been avoided by the French, the north- 
ern Ottawa River-Georgian Bay route had been 
the highway of travel and trade. The easier 
southern route was now open to the French, but 
it was even more convenient and accessible to 
their English rivals. The French were brought 
face to face with the problem of how to hold the 
trade of the upper lakes from the English. In 
the solution of this problem Detroit would be 
the key. 

There rushes through the strait of Detroit 
more water than through any other river in the 
world, save only the Niagara and the St. Law- 
rence. Through this channel, whose average 
width is a mile and whose length is only twenty- 
seven miles, pour in a steady, even current, un- 
broken by rapids or eddies, and with a speed of 
over two miles an hour, the waters of three lakes, 
Superior, Michigan, and Huron, and of the 
hundreds of streams that feed them. This little 
river is the natural outlet for eighty-two thousand 
square miles of lake surface and one hundred 
and twenty-five thousand square miles of land. 
Down the swift current floated in those early days 



The Founding of Detroit 91 

scores of canoes paddled by silent Indians and 
swarthy coureurs de bois, bearing to the mar- 
kets at Montreal, Quebec, and Albany loads of 
beaver, mink, and otter furs of immense value. 
They were the forerunners of a tonnage pass- 
ing through that strait which to-day exceeds that 
of the Thames and London. 

Cadillac and his soldiers and settlers, fifty each, 
had paddled, pushed, and carried their canoes, 
heavily laden with provisions, tools, ammunition, 
and supplies, all the way from Montreal. As 
they gazed on the beautiful site of their future 
homes, their weariness passed away. With shouts 
of joy they drew their canoes to the bank and 
unpacked their heavy loads for the last time. 

No exploring party had ever passed through 
the Detroit River without longing to stop. To 
appreciate the charm and wealth of that spot, one 
must read the vivid descriptions which were 
written by men of that time. Such an enthusiast 
was Cadillac. Two months after his arrival, he 
wrote home the following, which would do credit 
to a promoter's prospectus of the present day. 

" The business of war being so different from 
that of writing," he said, " I have not the ability 
to make a portrait of a country so worthy of a 



92 The Story of the Great Lakes 

better pen than mine ; but since you have di- 
rected me to render an account of it, I will do 
so/* He described the river and then continued : 
*' Its borders are so many vast prairies, and the 
freshness of the beautiful waters keeps the banks 
always green. The prairies are bordered by long 
and broad rows of fruit trees which have never 
felt the hand of the vigilant gardener. Here 
also orchards, young and old, soften and bend 
their branches, under the weight and quantity of 
their fruit, towards the mother earth which has 
produced them. It is in this land, so fertile, that 
the ambitious vine, which has never wept under 
the knife of the vine-dresser, builds a thick roof 
with its large leaves and heavy clusters, weighing 
down the top of the tree which receives it, and 
often stifling it with its embrace. 

"Under these broad walks one sees assembled 
by hundred the timid deer and fawn, also the 
squirrel bounding in his eagerness to collect the 
apples and plums with which the earth is covered. 
Here the cautious turkey calls and conducts her 
numerous brood to gather the grapes, and here 
also their mates come to fill their large and glutton- 
ous crops. Golden pheasants, the quail, the par- 
tridge, woodcock, and numerous doves swarm in 



The Founding of Detroit 93 

the woods and cover the country, which is dotted 
and broken with thickets and high forests of full- 
grown trees. . . . There are ten species of forest 
trees, among them are the walnut, white oak, red 
oak, the ash, the pine, whitewood and cotton- 
wood ; straight as arrows, without knots, and 
almost without branches, except at the very top, 
and of prodigious size. . . . The fish here are 
nourished and bathed by living water of crystal 
clearness, and their great abundance renders them 
none the less delicious. Swans are so numerous 
that one would take for lilies the reeds in which 
they are crowded together. The gabbling goose, 
the duck, the widgeon [a kind of duck], and the 
bustard are so abundant that to give an idea of 
their numbers I must use the expression of a 
savage whom I asked before arriving if there 
was much game. ' So much,' he said, ' that they 
draw up in lines to let the boats pass through.' 
. . . In a word, the climate is temperate, and 
the air purified through the day and night by a 
gentle breeze. The skies are always serene and 
spread sweet and fresh influence which makes one 
enjoy a tranquil sleep." 

Cadillac landed at the narrowest part of the 
river, where the city now stands, and began to 



94 The Story of the Great Lakes 

build the little village which was to survive with- 
out a break the conflicts of the coming century. 
In this wilderness, inhabited only by wild beasts 
and savages, the first thought must be for de- 
fence ; only when that was provided, could the 
settlers turn to plans for their own shelter from 
wind and weather. On the first rise of ground 
back from the river, along the line of the present 
Jefferson Avenue, Cadillac marked out a space 
of a little less than an acre, with a width of about 
two city blocks and a depth of one, which was to 
be enclosed by a palisade. Small trees were hewn 
in the forest and fashioned into sharply pointed 
pickets which were driven into the ground as 
closely as possible, thus forming a solid fence 
ten or twelve feet high. At the four corners 
were bastions of stout oak pickets from which 
the soldiers could shoot along the line of the 
paHsade. Inside the stockade, Cadillac laid out 
a street twelve feet wide, and assigned small lots 
to the settlers and soldiers. The settlers bought 
theirs outright, but Cadillac retained the owner- 
ship of the others. 

Fifty hours after their landing, on the day 
sacred to St. Anne, they began the foundation 
of a chapel on the very spot where St. Anne's 



The Founding of Detroit 95 

church stands to-day. In a month the chapel 
was completed by a rude cross placed over the 
door, and a bell summoned the colonists to daily 
prayers. When the storehouse and magazine for 
ammunition were also finished the people set to 
work on their own log huts. Trees were cut in 
the forest, and the rough-hewn logs were hauled 
to the spot. There a framework was set up, the 
logs were fitted into it, and the cracks were filled 
with mortar and mud. Last of all the top was 
covered with a roof of birch bark, or was thatched 
with grass. Land outside the stockade was as- 
signed for agriculture, each soldier having a half 
acre for cultivation, and the civilians larger tracts. 
That very year wheat was sown for the next sum- 
mer. With remarkable speed the settlement 
sprang up in the wilderness, and before the end 
of August took on an appearance of stability and 
permanence. 

Cadillac now summoned the Indians to council 
and urged them to build settlements in the vicin- 
ity. He was wise enough to see that if a suffi- 
cient number of friendly Indians located near by, 
traders would come to buy their furs, the colony 
could rely on greater numbers in case of attack, 
and the scanty three months' supply of provisions 



96 The Story of the Great Lakes 

brought from Montreal could be eked out by 
food bought from Indian hunters. Three large 
villages sprang up, and within eight months the 
population of the strait was some six thousand 
people, whites and Indians. 

Hitherto there had been on the Great Lakes 
nothing looking to family life or permanent resi- 
dence, but in the spring of 1702, Madame Cadillac 
and Madame Tonty, wife of the captain of the 
garrison, started in open canoes, manned by 
Indians and Canadians, on the seven-hundred- 
mile journey from Montreal to Detroit. At a 
season when storms were likely to be frequent 
these two women braved the hardships of the 
trip, going up the rapids of the St. Lawrence, 
across Lake Ontario and around Niagara, and up 
Lake Erie to the strait. With her Madame 
Cadillac brought her little boy, Jacques, six years 
of age ; her oldest son was already with his father. 
These were the first white women to come to the 
Great Lakes. They were soon followed by the 
wives and families of other settlers. By 1708 the 
settlement had grown so fast that houses were 
built outside the stockade, as the twenty-nine huts 
within the enclosure were not sufficient to accorfi- 
modate the people. 



The Founding of Detroit 97 

The little colony suffered the usual troubles of 
frontier life, but managed to survive them. In 
1703 several of the buildings were destroyed by a 
fire set by the Indians. For the first few years 
the colony was managed by a company, but in 
1705 Cadillac succeeded in getting full control 
and ruled there with as absolute sway as had any 
feudal chief in his turreted castle. He owned the 
public buildings and defences and he alone could 
grant lots for settlement. From him alone could 
the people obtain their liquor, and to prevent 
excessive drinking by the Indians and traders he 
restricted the amount sold to each person at one 
time and charged a high price for it. To him 
also all must come for permits to carry on their 
different trades and occupations. For every 
privilege the people must pay, and right bitterly 
did they complain of their commandant to his 
enemies, though when he walked along the nar- 
row street, firm and erect, in soldierly costume 
and with clanking sword, every hat was doffed. 
Doubtless some of his charges were exorbitant, 
but the money was turned back into the improve- 
ment of the colony, as, for instance, to build a 
public windmill where the people could pay to 
have their corn ground. The blacksmith com- 

H 



98 The Story of the Great Lakes 

plained that he had to pay six hundred francs a 
year and two casks of ale for the privilege of 
blacksmithing, besides having to keep all Cadillac's 
horses shod. The latter task could not have 
been very arduous, for until 1706 there were no 
horses in the settlement, and of the three that 
Cadillac bought in that year only one, named 
Colin, was alive in 171 1. 

In 17 10 Cadillac was ordered to go to 
Louisiana to govern the colony there, and his 
connection with Detroit and the Great Lakes was 
brought to an abrupt end. The settlement which 
he handed over to his successor was fairly pros- 
perous. In the following winter, however, while 
the men of the neighboring Indian tribes were 
away at their hunting-grounds, a thousand or 
more hostile Indians of the Fox- Wisconsin river 
tribes descended upon the region and prepared to 
settle there. The colonists were powerless to 
prevent them, but waited anxiously for the return 
of the hunting-parties. In May they came, and 
under the leadership of the French finally drove 
off the enemy after a hard and bloody siege in 
which many lives were lost. For the next ten 
years the colony was so weak that its abandon- 
ment was contemplated. Successive governors 



The Founding of Detroit 99 

mismanaged its internal affairs, demanding tolls 
and fees so exorbitant that traders refused to come 
there. Cadillac's demands had been for the ad- 
vancement of the colony ; these men used their 
power to enrich themselves. 

In 1720 and 172 1, financial distress in France 
sent many a ruined Frenchman to Detroit, so 
that in 1722 the population was again two hun- 
dred, as it had been at the time of its founder's 
departure. For the next thirty years the story 
of Detroit was uneventful. The settlement in- 
creased gradually in numbers and strength. Of 
its hardships we may best judge by the large 
mortality of children in those years. By the 
middle of the century we find the authorities in 
Canada so eager to have the colonies on the Great 
Lakes strong and permanent, that the following 
inducements are offered in a proclamation 
posted, by order of the governor-general, in all 
the parishes of Canada : — 

" Every man who will go to settle in Detroit 
shall receive gratuitously, one spade, one axe, one 
ploughshare, one large and one small wagon. 
We will make an advance of other two tools to 
be paid for in two years only. He will be given 
a cow, . . . also a sow. Seed will be advanced 



lOO The Story of the Great Lakes 

the first year, to be returned at the third harvest. 
The women and children will be supported for 
one year. Those will be deprived of the liber- 
ality of the King who shall give themselves up 
to trade in place of agriculture.*' 

In this way men with families were encouraged 
to make France strong in her western outposts. 
Within a year one hundred persons responded, 
and an official census shows a population at 
Detroit of nearly five hundred persons, of whom 
thirty-three were women over fifteen, and ninety- 
five girls under that age. This represents no 
mere floating population of traders and adven- 
turers. The property returns of the inhabitants 
show them to have been an agricultural people 
who made the most of the rich land on which 
they lived. In the census they reported one 
hundred and sixty horses in place of the one of 
forty years before, and six hundred and eighty- 
two cattle. The fertility of the strait of Detroit 
seemed to inspire even the roving Canadian, usu- 
ally so restless and adventurous, with a desire to 
plant and develop a home. 



CHAPTER IX 

NIAGARA AND THE LOSS OF CANADA 

THE importance of Niagara in trade and 
warfare was early recognized by both the 
French and the English as well as by the 
Iroquois. La Salle and Denonville, in their desire 
to monopolize the Indian trade, had built fortified 
storehouses on the shore of the river, but both 
had been destroyed by the Iroquois. By the 
beginning of the eighteenth century, the English 
began to make serious inroads on the fur trade 
of the interior, and the French became more 
anxious than ever to secure a permanent foot- 
hold at Niagara. For twenty-five years French 
and English orators harangued at Indian councils, 
begging for permission to build forts or trading 
houses at that point ; governors wrote home for 
the necessary funds to purchase the Indians' 
consent ; and rival traders watched every camp 
on the river with suspicion. At length French 
diplomacy won the day. In 1720, Joncaire, with 



lOI 



I02 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the help of Charles Le Moyne, Chevalier de 
Longueuil, gained from the Indians a reluctant 
consent to the building of a bark house at Ni- 
agara. He made the most of this permission, 
and on the site of Lewiston built a large house, 
forty feet wide and thirty long, which could 
accommodate fifty traders. This he surrounded 
with a high fence or palisade and named the 
Magazin Royal. In their turn the English built 
a similar, though smaller, house at Oswego 
(1722), from which the Indians could go by 
portage by the Oswego River to Lake Oneida, 
and, gaining the Mohawk, could paddle their 
fur-laden canoes to Albany. 

In their first permission to the French, the 
Iroquois had carefully stipulated that the house 
to be built at Niagara should be of bark, for they 
had learned the danger of stone forts. Now, Le 
Moyne told them that he could not keep his 
skins dry in a bark house, and wrung from them 
an unwilling consent to the erection of a stone 
house, provided it be " no stone fort." The 
authorities at once wrote to the king, asking for 
money to defray the expense of building a house 
of solid masonry. De Lery, the king's chief 
engineer, who had come out to fortify Quebec 



Niagara and the Loss of Canada 103 

and Montreal, was directed to proceed to Ni- 
agara, and to build this trading house. He 
decided not to put it near Joncaire's station, 
which was seven miles up the river, where the 
rapids made further navigation impossible, but 
to place it at the outlet of the river into Lake 
Ontario. On the eastern bank of the Niagara, 
near its mouth, he began the erection of the stone 
structure which stands to-day as the oldest part 
of the government buildings at Fort Niagara. It 
took two summers in time and thirty thousand 
livres in money to build. When completed, the 
house of stone possessed four bastions erected 
with a massiveness of construction that makes it 
strong after nearly two hundred years have passed 
away. Charles Le Moyne, who had gained the 
Indians' consent to the building of this stone 
house, was put in command and held it for many 
years. The first Charles Le Moyne came to 
Canada in 1654, and for a century his sons and 
grandsons played most important parts in the 
building up of the French power in the New 
World. Two of his sons led the attack on 
Schenectady, and later founded Louisiana ; a third 
son fell in the defence of Quebec against Sir Will- 
iam Phips in 1690, and another in the struggle 



I04 The Story of the Great Lakes 

with the English for Hudson's Bay. The sec- 
ond Charles Le Moyne accompanied La Barre 
and Denonville on their expeditions against the 
Iroquois, and the third established this fortified 
post at Niagara. 

In a hundred and forty years, more or less, the 
French had made wonderful progress in opening 
up the interior of North America to exploration 
and trade ; they had founded settlements at the 
extremities of their dominion on the St. Law- 
rence and the lower Mississippi, and had con- 
nected these by a chain of forts on the Great 
Lakes and the northern tributaries of the Missis- 
sippi ; but they had established only one strong 
colony in the interior, the settlement at Detroit. 
As the middle of the eighteenth century ap- 
proached, they awoke to the need of making 
good their claim to the Ohio Valley, building a 
line of forts at Presque Isle on Lake Erie, Le 
Boeuf, Venango, and Duquesne, on the route 
from that lake to the Ohio River. They also 
strengthened themselves by erecting a fort on the 
southern shore of Lake Erie at Sandusky, about 
halfway between Cleveland and Detroit. The 
energy of the French was in part due to the ex- 
hibition of an intention of the English to enter 



M \ ^T 




Niagara and the Loss of Canada 105 

the great interior basin ; but the French activity 
aroused the English, and in 1754 the final con- 
test for the control of the continent began in the 
western wilderness of Virginia and Pennsylvania. 
With the war elsewhere, this book has nothing 
to do ; the campaigns for the capture of Du- 
quesne, Louisbourg, Ticonderoga, Quebec, and 
Montreal, all took place far away from the shores 
of the Great Lakes ; but it was the success of the 
English in these other fields that determined the 
fate of the interior. From the beginning the im- 
portance of Niagara had been recognized by both 
combatants, but the strength of its position de- 
ferred an attack upon it for several years. In 
1758 the English captured Fort Frontenac, and 
the next summer made a determined attack on 
Niagara. 

The fort at Niagara was now commanded by a 
French officer and engineer. Captain Pouchot ; 
he had strengthened and enlarged the fortifica- 
tions and had a garrison of six hundred men well 
supplied with food and ammunition. The Eng- 
lish general, Prideaux, marched with a force of 
twenty-three hundred men from Oswego and laid 
siege to the fort. The English engineers opened 
the trenches so near the fort that they were 



To6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

oblisfed to withdraw and build a second series. 
When the artillery was placed in position and 
opened fire, one of the first shells to be dis- 
charged burst prematurely, and a fragment strik- 
ing General Prideaux on the head, killed him 
instantly. Sir William Johnson took command 
in his place and carried on the siege effectively. 

In two or three weeks the French garrison was 
reduced to the last extremity. The walls and 
defences were riddled with shot and broken 
through ; more than a hundred of the defenders 
were killed or seriously wounded, and all were 
worn out with the strain of the constant defence 
day and night. Captain Pouchot still held out, 
for ever since the siege began he had been watch- 
ing for expected assistance from the western posts. 
An army of thirteen hundred French and Indians 
had been orathered from the stations of the Illinois 
River and from Detroit, Michilimackinac, Le 
Boeuf, and Venango, to defend the Ohio Valley. 
As soon as Pouchot heard that the English were 
coming to attack Niagara he had sent a summons 
to the leaders of this force to come to his aid, and 
now he was dailv and hourly expecting their 
arrival, together with the garrison of Fort Du- 
quesne, which had abandoned that place on the 



Niagara and the Loss of Canada 107 

approach of an English army under General 
Forbes. 

The western reenforcement was even now com- 
ing up Lake Erie under the leadership of two 
French generals. It was an oddly assorted force, 
such as no other time or place could have pro- 
duced. A company of well-drilled colonial militia 
paddled their boats beside the canoes of a war- 
party of Indians who had been induced by traders 
to come from their distant homes to take part in 
the white men's strife. Hardly less savage than 
the Indian warriors were the western traders and 
coureurs de bois, who had lived so long in Indian 
wigwams that they had adopted the dress, the 
war-paint, and the customs of their neighbors. 
All the members of this mixed company were 
alike, however, in one thing, — they were skilled 
in the warfare of the woods. 

From Lake Erie the fleet paddled past the site 
of Buffalo and down the swift-moving Niagara 
River around Grand Island, and, on the morn- 
ing of July 24, 1759, the soldiers and Indians 
landed at the head of the portage path, a mile 
and a half above the falls. Here the French 
found the ruins of their Fort of the Portage, of 
Fort Little Niagara, a trading station which had 



io8 The Story of the Great Lakes 

been fortified in 1750. Joncaire, a son of the 
Joncaire who built the first trading house on the 
river, had occupied this post till recently, but had 
burned it at the approach of the British. The 
army made its way up over the rough seven-mile 
portage path and down over the rocks to the old 
French trading house. From here they pro- 
ceeded cautiously along the bank of the river. 

Sir William Johnson had meanwhile been in- 
formed by scouts of the approach of the expected 
French reenforcement. He divided his twenty- 
three hundred men into three bodies, — one to 
guard the boats on Lake Ontario, one to hold 
the trenches, and the third to cut off the advance 
of the southern army. For this last company he 
picked the provincial light infantry, two com- 
panies of grenadiers, and a hundred and fifty men 
of the Forty-sixth Regiment. They were com- 
manded by Colonel Massey, under whose orders 
they threw up, about a mile and a half up the 
river from the fort, a rough breastwork of felled 
trees behind which they could stand and pour shot 
into the ranks of the advancing enemy. The 
Iroquois warriors who had come with Johnson 
were placed along the flanks of the English. 
They had recently shown signs of disaffection, 



Niagara and the Loss of Canada 109 

and when the French army came in sight they 
opened a parley with the Indian alUes of the 
French. This did not last long, for they could 
come to no agreement, and without further delay 
the savages threw themselves into the fight with 
wild war-whoops. 

The French made a gallant fight, but were fa- 
tally hampered by their unprotected position. For 
half an hour they made sallies, retreating each time 
after heavy losses, but led back for another assault 
by those who survived of their heroic officers. 
At last their ranks were completely broken, and 
they fled along the shore to regain the portage 
road around the falls and escape to their boats. 
For five miles the English pursued them through 
the woods, capturing and bringing back as many 
as they could overtake. The bravery of the 
French officers and the desperate efforts that 
they made to check the retreat are shown by the 
fact that nearly all of them were either killed or cap- 
tured. Their followers hastened back to their boats 
and retreated across Lake Erie, burning, on their 
way, Presque Isle, Le Boeuf, and Venango, and 
journeying to the safe and distant fort of Detroit. 

On the morning of July 24th, Captain 
Pouchot, shut up in the fort at Niagara, heard 



no The Story of the Great Lakes 

the sound of distant firing and began to watch 
for his alHes. Through the open spaces of the 
forest, he could see in the far distance, moving 
forms and groups of men meeting and parting. 
The EngHsh had evidently gone out to attack 
the advancing army ; the cannonading from the 
trenches which had sounded for so long in the 
ears of the garrison had ceased, and the trenches 
seemed deserted. Captain Pouchot called for 
volunteers to sally forth from the fort and de- 
stroy the English works ; but as soon as they 
appeared the English soldiers stationed there by 
Johnson sprang up from their hiding places be- 
hind the works and forced the French to retreat 
into their fortification. 

At last the sound of distant firing stopped and 
the smoke of guns ceased to rise from the scene 
of the conflict. The garrison waited hour after 
hour in anxious suspense. About two o'clock in 
the afternoon a friendly Indian slipped through 
the lines and told of the utter rout of the relieving 
force. Captain Pouchot refused to believe him, 
but at four o'clock, after a sharp cannonade from 
the English had been answered by a similar dis- 
charge from the besieged garrison, a trumpet was 
sounded in the English trenches, and an officer 



Niagara and the Loss of Canada iii 

approached the fort with a demand for its sur- 
render. He presented also a paper with the 
names of the captive French officers. Captain 
Pouchot still refused to admit to the enemy his 
belief in the disaster, and sent an officer of his 
own to see the prisoners. His worst fears were 
confirmed when the officer returned with the 
report that under a shelter of boughs near John- 
son*s tent were sixteen officers, some of them 
severely wounded. 

All hope for the French was gone, and Captain 
Pouchot could only endeavor to arrange for his 
garrison honorable terms of surrender. Such 
terms the English, recognizing the gallant con- 
duct of their enemies, were glad to grant. The 
French were accorded all the honors of prisoners 
of war, although they must be sent under guard 
to New York. Pouchot asked and was granted 
a special stipulation that they should be protected 
from their Indian enemies, who might take this 
occasion to revenge themselves for the massacre 
at Fort William Henry three years before. He 
signed the articles of surrender and delivered over 
to the English the fort with ten officers and four 
hundred and eighty-six men, besides women and 
children. 



112 The Story of the Great Lakes 

The surrender of Niagara broke the line of com- 
munication between Montreal and the interior. 
In the next year, 1760, the Marquis de Vaudreuil 
signed articles of capitulation by which Canada 
and all its dependencies passed into the hands of 
the English, and French supremacy on the Great 
Lakes was ended. It remained only for the con- 
querors to take possession of the other French 
posts on the Great Lakes. 



CHAPTER X 

THE CONSPIRACY OF PONTIAC 

ON the thirteenth day of September, 1760, 
five days after the surrender of Montreal, 
Major Robert Rogers, the most energetic 
Indian fighter of the time, set out from Montreal 
with two hundred of his "Rangers," whose ex- 
ploits in war had made his name famous, for the 
lakes. He was to take possession of Detroit and 
the other lake forts for England. Reaching Niag- 
ara on the first day of October, they crossed by por- 
tage to the site of the modern Buffalo and skirted 
the southern shore of Lake Erie, encamping 
nightly on its margin and taking every precaution 
by day to keep the boats from losing sight of one 
another on the rough, stormy waters. One night 
on the Cuyahoga River, near where the present 
city of Cleveland now stands, a party of Indians 
entered the camp and announced themselves to 
be ambassadors from Pontiac, " the king and lord 
I 113 



114 The Story of the Great Lakes 

of that country," who requested them to halt 
until he himself should arrive. In a few hours 
the great sachem stalked into camp. He was of 
medium height, with an active, muscular figure, 
and a stern face. His first words were an im- 
perious demand as to Major Rogers' business. 
" How dare you," said he, " enter my country 
without my leave ? " "I do not come with 
any design against you or your people," replied 
Rogers, " but to remove out of your country the 
French, who have been an obstacle in our way 
to mutual peace and commerce." The Indian 
who greeted Rogers so haughtily was the prin- 
cipal chief of the Ottawa and Ojibway tribes, 
a man to whom all the nations of the Illinois 
country deferred and whose name was held in 
respect even by the distant Algonquins of the 
St. Lawrence. Rogers told him of his present 
mission, taking occasion to dwell on the total 
defeat of the French in Canada, and gave him 
several belts of wampum in token of his friendly 
intent. These Pontiac accepted with dignity, but 
without any sign of unbending. He announced 
that he stood in the path the English travelled in 
until the next morning, and proffered a string of 
wampum to intimate that they must not march 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 115 

farther without his leave. He inquired whether 
the party was in need of anything he or his 
warriors could supply, and then withdrew. 

The English kept a double force on guard all 
night, but in the morning Pontiac came with his 
attendant chiefs and declared that he had made 
peace with Rogers and his detachment, and that 
they might therefore pass through his country 
unmolested and expel the French garrison from 
Detroit. He was inclined, he said, to live peace- 
ably with the English while they used him as he 
deserved, but if they treated him with neglect, he 
should shut up the way and exclude them from his 
domains. The pipe of peace was passed around 
the council fire and smoked by officers and chiefs 
alike. 

As Rogers and his men proceeded on their 
way, they found the march made easy by the 
powerful influence of Pontiac, who dissuaded a 
war-party of Detroit Indians from attacking 
them, furnished guides and welcome supplies of 
venison, turkeys, and parched corn. He even 
sent word ahead to the Indians within the limits 
of the fort that he was a friend of the English, 
making it impossible for the French commander 
to get any help from them. In the role of 



ii6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

guide, counsellor, and patronizing friend of the 
newly arrived strangers, this remarkable savage 
comes for the first time into prominence in 
history. Three years later he was to make of 
what would have been without his leadership a 
series of spasmodic and scattering raids a formi- 
dable and sustained Indian uprising of the most 
serious kind. 

Rogers took Detroit, sent the French com- 
mander and his garrison down to Niagara, dis- 
armed the Canadian militia, and received the oath 
of allegiance from all the inhabitants ; and in a 
few hours Detroit was, in name at least, an Eng- 
lish town. Within a year all the posts on the 
lakes came into English possession ; but the 
English were far from gaining the hearty support 
of either the French-Canadian inhabitants, — 
who were naturally not pleased at this change of 
hands, — or even of the Indian tribes, who liked 
the French. 

The French had always had unusual success in 
dealing with the Indians. They were friendly 
v/ith them, tolerant of their presence, and generous 
with their gifts, without any insulting show of 
patronage. The previous reputation of the Eng- 
lish was bad among the Indians. They resented 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 117 

their austere manners, their steady seizure of 
forest lands for agriculture, and their ill-concealed 
contempt for the red man. This bad name had 
been somewhat obscured in these recent years by 
the excellent prices paid by the English for furs, 
and their lavish gifts to gain Indian support; but 
it was now confirmed at every post along the 
whole frontier. 

When the two rival nations were using the 
Indians as alHes, both had treated them with 
respect and endeavored to gain their friendship. 
Now the Indians began to reaHze that this friend- 
ship was no longer considered valuable, but that 
the EngHsh were insolently seizing more and 
more of their domain with the apparent intention 
of driving them out. Their chiefs were no longer 
treated with respect as they hung about the white 
men's forts. Owing to a sudden policy of re- 
trenchment the gifts, too, were cut down or with- 
held altogether, until the savages really suffered 
from want of supplies which the wise Frenchmen 
had seen the necessity of providing for them. 
The customary amount of powder was denied 
them, and the Indians feared lest their indepen- 
dence was threatened. The English fur trade was 
in lawless hands, and the traders abused and out- 



ii8 The Story of the Great Lakes 

raged the Indians while they cheated them out of 
their lawful dues. The discontent of the natives 
was encouraged and fostered by the French traders 
and settlers, who told their sullen audiences in- 
credible tales of the further evil purposes of the 
English, and spread far and wide a rumor that 
the armies of the French were even now advanc- 
ing up the St. Lawrence and Mississippi rivers to 
drive out these pretenders. 

Suddenly, in May, 1763, the Indians uprose. 
With characteristic secrecy and stealth the tribes 
had exchanged wampum belts, spreading the sum- 
mons to war and signifying in return acquiescence 
in the plan, with hardly a suspicion on the part 
of their indifferent English neighbors. Occa- 
sionally in the last month a story was brought in 
that roused the anxiety of those who were wise 
in the ways of the Indians, but these were laughed 
to scorn. Looking backward, one marvels both 
at the secrecy with which the uprising was planned, 
and at the serene confidence of the scanty garri- 
sons stationed at these isolated and dangerous out- 
posts. From contemporary accounts it appears 
that at Presque Isle there were twenty-seven 
men ; at Michilimackinac thirty-five men with 
their officers ; at the foot of Lake Michigan, on 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 119 

the St. Joseph's River, fifteen, and at Fort Miami 
ten, while the other posts were held by mere 
handfuls of soldiers ; Detroit was the only station 
that was suitably manned. 

In their dealings with white men, the Indians 
had never before been banded together under a 
single leader. The tribes were restless and jeal- 
ous of one another, but Pontiac restrained and 
humored them. He made his plans so well, and 
they were carried out so secretly and energetically, 
that within ten weeks of the time when the first 
blow was struck, not a single post remained in 
British hands west of Niagara, save only the fort 
of Detroit, where he himself conducted the siege 
in person. 

The garrison at Detroit was commanded by 
Major Gladwin, a young British officer, who had 
taken an active part in the war with the French, 
and had been at Detroit for nearly a year. He 
had eight officers and one hundred and twenty 
men in his command ; and besides the Canadian 
residents, whose white cottages lined either bank 
of the river, there were about forty fur traders at 
the settlement. The original stockade had been 
several times enlarged since Cadillac's day, once 
recently during the three years of English occupa- 



I20 The Story of the Great Lakes 

tlon. It contained about a hundred small houses, 
a well-built group of barracks, a council house, 
and a church. Three rows of pickets, twenty-fiv^e 
feet high, with large gateways surmounted by 
blockhouses for observation and defence, had 
taken the place of the original twelve-foot fence. 
Within each gateway, which was closed at sunset, 
was a small wicket, through which one person 
could enter at a time. This was kept open until 
nine o'clock. The fort was protected by three 
small cannon, one carrying three-pound balls, 
the other two six-pounders; but these guns were 
badly mounted and better calculated to terrify the 
Indians than to render much actual assistance. 
Far more effective were the two small vessels, 
the Beaver and the Gladwin^ which lay anchored 
in the stream. 

At a council on the 27th of April, 1763, Pon- 
tiac inflamed the minds of his hearers by reporting 
a vision vouchsafed to him by the Great Spirit, 
who asked him why the Indians suffered these 
English, — " these dogs dressed in red," — to 
dwell among them. The first step of his plan, 
as he unfolded it to his warriors, was to spy out 
the land. On May-day, 1760, forty men of the 
Ottawa tribe, purporting to have returned from 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 121 

their winter hunting-grounds, went to the fort and 
asked permission to dance the calumet dance be- 
fore the EngHsh officers. They were admitted, 
and while thirty of them danced, the remaining 
ten strolled about and noted every detail of the 
defence, all retiring at the close without rousing 
any suspicion in the minds of their hosts. 

Four days later one of the leading French set- 
tlers brought in word that his wife, while pur- 
chasing supplies in the Ottawa village, had found 
the warriors filing off the ends of their gun-bar- 
rels so as to make them only about a yard long, 
probably with some treacherous intent of conceal- 
ing them more easily. The next day Major 
Gladwin was informed of the plot for the destruc- 
tion of his garrison on the morrow. Two stories 
are told of the source of this information, — one 
that an Indian girl to whom he had been kind 
made it known to him, and another that a friendly 
young warrior told him. We would like to be- 
lieve the former, which tells of the reluctance of 
the beautiful girl to depart after she had done her 
errand of delivering a pair of embroidered mocca- 
sins ordered by Major Gladwin, and of her con- 
fession to him, when he pressed her for the 
reason of her sad manner, that danger threatened 



122 The Story of the Great Lakes 

him and his men. Gladwin hardly believed the 
story, but made all preparations to thwart the 
plans of Pontiac if occasion offered. 

The next morning the guards in the block- 
house saw Pontiac and sixty men land from their 
canoes and walk in Indian file up the river road 
towards the gateway of the stockade. They were 
admitted and escorted to the council chamber, 
where Major Gladwin and his principal officers 
were awaiting them. It is said that even the iron 
composure of Pontiac was shaken and that he 
gave a momentary start when he saw drawn up 
on either side of the gateway and standing about 
in watchful groups in the streets the armed sol- 
diers of the garrison. The officers, too, were in 
full uniform with their swords at their sides and 
a brace of pistols in their belts. Before he was 
seated Pontiac asked, " Why do I see so many of 
my father*s young men standing in the street with 
their guns?** "To keep them in good discipline 
and exercise them," replied Major Gladwin, 
through his interpreter. 

When the Indians were seated on the skins 
prepared for them, Pontiac began his address. 
Holding in his hand the wampum belt which had 
been agreed upon as the signal for attack, he 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 123 

spoke of the friendship of the Indians for the 
English. Once, it is said, he raised it as if to 
give the signal, but Gladwin signed with his hand 
and the soldiers without the open door made a 
clattering with their arms. Pontiac trembled and 
gave the belt in the usual way instead of in the 
manner agreed upon in the council. 

Gladwin replied that the Indians should have 
the friendship of the English just so long as they 
kept the peace, but not one moment longer. 
Some writers say that he drew aside the blanket 
of the chief nearest to him and showed hidden 
in its folds a shortened gun. At any rate, the 
English found out that every chief was armed, 
and knew that they had narrowly escaped a 
frightful massacre. The Indians were awed by 
the sharp rebuke of Gladwin into departing 
quietly. For two days they attempted to parley 
with the English and gain admittance by deceit ; 
but Gladwin was firm that not more than sixty 
might enter the fort at one time, and on the 9th 
of May Pontiac threw aside his mask of pre- 
tended friendship. Hostilities were begun by the 
Indians murdering an old English sergeant who 
lived on a neighboring island. 

The Indians moved their camp to the same 



124 'T^^ Story of the Great Lakes 

side of the river as the fort, establishing them- 
selves just above the line of the French houses. 
One more attempt was made for peace, when two 
brave English officers, Captain Campbell and 
Lieutenant McDougall, insisted upon risking 
their lives in the Indian camp to see if they could 
persuade the savages to desist from war. Both 
were detained by the Indians in spite of the pre- 
vious promises of Pontiac. Lieutenant Mc- 
Dougall later made his escape, but Captain 
Campbell was murdered by the natives in an out- 
burst of anger. The blockade of Detroit was 
begun, and many months were to pass before a 
white man could venture in daylight to step 
outside the little wicket or to show his head at a 
port-hole or window without fear of Indian bullets. 
For weeks every one from Major Gladwin down 
to the lowest soldier was on the watch night and 
day, no man lying down to sleep except in his 
clothes and with his gun beside him. The garri- 
son began to suffer for food and would have been 
forced to withdraw from the fort and escape down 
the lake, had not a few friendly Canadians smug- 
gled in supplies. The Indians, too, whose method 
of warfare is that of sudden attack rather than of 
protracted siege, had not sufficient food, but 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 125 

began to make raids on the Canadian families, 
who, though taking no part in the struggle, were 
in general indifferent to the English. At a time 
like this the remarkable gifts of Pontiac came out. 
With a foresight and method most unusual in a 
savage he established a base of supplies, under- 
took a systematic levy on those who had provi- 
sions, and gave out a regular amount each day to 
every Indian. 

On the 29th of May, after the blockade had 
been going on for three weeks, the long-expected 
boats from Niagara, which had been summoned 
by Major Gladwin in the first days of the siege, 
were seen rounding the wooded point below the 
fort, the red flag of England flying at their sterns. 
All was rejoicing within the fort until, as the 
boats came nearer, the English saw that they were 
occupied and guided by Indians. Three English- 
men who escaped to the fort brought a mournful 
tale of a night attack and seizure of the boats at 
the mouth of the Detroit River, and also of the 
destruction of Sandusky and Presque Isle. This 
was the first of many reports that were to come 
during that month of similar successful attacks, 
until the little garrison at Detroit was the only 
one left on the upper lakes. The remaining 



126 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Englishmen of the rescuing party were massacred 
that night in the Indian camp. 

Towards the end of June Pontiac sent another 
summons to surrender, saying that nine hundred 
Indians from the north were on their way to join 
him. Major Gladwin refused to consider terms 
till Captain Campbell and Lieutenant McDougall 
were returned to him, and once more hostilities 
were resumed. On the 30th of June the Gladwin^ 
which about the middle of May had eluded the 
Indians and slipped down the river to Niagara, 
succeeded in making her way up the river and land- 
ing at the fort a force of fifty men, together with 
much-needed provisions and ammunition. She 
brought the news that peace had been formally 
concluded between England and France. While 
many of the French-Canadians refused to admit 
the truth of this report and continued to romance 
to the Indians about large French armies that 
were approaching, forty settlers accepted their new 
position as English subjects and took service under 
Gladwin. Through them the English officers were 
kept even better informed of what went on with- 
out the fort than before, but always throughout 
the blockade there seem to have been daily 
reports from some source of what happened in 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 127 

the Indian camp, as well as frequent sorties from 
the fort. 

During the month of July the efforts of the 
Indians were directed particularly against the two 
armed vessels, which had not only afforded de- 
fence to the fort and brought men and supplies, 
but had begun to make trips up the river to a 
point opposite the Indian camp, from which they 
could pour shot into the wigwams. One night 
the attention of the watchful sentries was attracted 
by a mass of flames shooting up into the sky 
in the general direction of the Indian camp. 
Their first thought was that the village was on 
fire, but the mass of flame seemed to be moving 
and to come nearer. A huge fire-float, made of 
four bateaux^ filled with fagots, birch bark, and 
tar, appeared on the water, drifting down to set 
fire to the schooners anchored opposite the fort. 
The vessels were anchored by two cables, and as 
the blazing raft approached, they slipped one 
cable and swung to the other side of the river 
while the raft floated harmlessly by, lighting up 
the fort and the dark shores till it burned itself 
down to the water's edge. 

1 Bateau, the French word for boat, usually applied to a flat-bottomed boat 
with pointed ends. 



128 The Story of the Great Lakes 

The next event of the blockade came at the 
end of that month. On the 29th of July the 
garrison heard firing down the river. They waited 
anxiously, wondering what new disaster was to 
fall upon them, for similar sounds had often been 
followed by the arrival of a single survivor from 
some abandoned fort with a tale of Indian butch- 
ery. Half an hour later the sentries called to 
their officers to come quickly, for the whole sur- 
face of the water was covered with boats. In 
breathless suspense the weary garrison waited to 
see if the story of two months before was to be 
repeated and dusky forms were to appear crouch- 
ing in captured English vessels ; but they were re- 
assured by the salute of an English gun. In an 
hour two hundred and sixty men had landed 
at the little wharf and been welcomed with cheers 
and shouts. Captain Dalyell had been sent from 
Niagara with companies from two regiments and 
with twenty of Rogers' Rangers, commanded by 
Major Rogers himself, to put an end to the siege. 

The newcomers were eager to sally forth and 
meet the Indians. Gladwin, who had been made 
wary by long months of experience with Pontiac, 
strenuously opposed Dalyell's plan of a night 
attack, and only gave his consent when the latter 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 129 

threatened to leave Detroit unless some such bold 
stroke was permitted. About two o'clock in the 
morning, on the thirty-first day of July, two hun- 
dred and fifty men marched in three detachments 
up the bank of the river, past the French cottages, 
to a little stream a mile and a half above the fort. 
Treacherous Canadians, who had in some way 
learned of the plan, had warned the Indians, and 
as the advance guard passed across the bridge 
which spanned the stream, the Indians dashed 
down from the heights above and poured volleys 
of musketry into the English ranks. The sol- 
diers recoiled for a moment; then they pushed on 
over the bridge, but the savages vanished yelling 
into the darkness beyond. For a time the Eng- 
lish pressed on, shot at from every side ; but flesh 
and blood could not stand against this invisible 
enemy. The remaining troops endeavored to 
retreat in orderly fashion, but were soon under 
heavy fire again from a rear ambuscade of Indians. 
Major Rogers gained entrance to a house on the 
road and from its windows commanded the road 
with his guns and covered the retreat. The two 
bateaux which had followed the party up the 
river were loaded with the dead and wounded. 
Slowly the English made their way back under 



130 The Story of the Great Lakes 

constant fire, and by eight o'clock the survivors 
gained the shelter of the fort. Of the two hun- 
dred and fifty who had gone out six hours before, 
one hundred and fifty-nine had been killed or 
wounded, and Captain Dalyell himself had lost 
his life. The victory of Bloody Run, as the 
stream was ever afterwards called, restored the 
confidence of Pontiac and brought many acces- 
sions to his side; but in spite of this disaster 
Major Gladwin, with his reenforced garrison of 
over two hundred able-bodied men, was confident 
of ultimate success. 

The schooner Gladwin made her way again 
to Niagara and returned early in September with 
a welcome load of forty-seven barrels of flour and 
one hundred barrels of pork, but with a tale of 
Indian attack and the loss of six of her crew of 
twelve. Other attempts from Niagara to relieve 
the garrison were unsuccessful, but Pontiac re- 
ceived in October a heavy blow in a letter from 
the French commander at Fort Chartres in the 
Illinois country, saying that not only could he 
offer Pontiac no help but he was now at peace 
with the English and wished the Indians to follow 
his example. This message had its effect. Pon- 
tiac had had great hopes of French assistance. 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 131 

With these hopes dashed he knew he could not 
hold out much longer ; already his warriors were 
wearying of the attack and deserting him. He 
sent a letter to Gladwin asking for peace and 
agreeing to forget the "bad things that had hap- 
pened," if the Englishman would do the same. 
Gladwin replied that he would grant a truce while 
he sent Pontiac's message to his general, who 
alone had power to grant pardon. 

As it was then late in the season, it was deemed 
best to leave matters in this condition until spring, 
as it held the Indians in a wholesome state of un- 
certainty. Within a few days the encampments 
in the vicinity of Detroit were abandoned. After 
a confinement of five long months the inhabitants 
of the town could venture outside the stockade 
without dread of Indian bullets. 

A report was sent to General Amherst, the 
commander of the British army, and during the 
winter plans were made to relieve Detroit and 
bring peace to the lake region. A military expe- 
dition was to be sent in the spring to force the 
tribes into submission ; and in the meantime 
Sir William Johnson, the superintendent of In- 
dian affairs, despatched messages to all the tribes, 
warning them of the coming expedition and 



132 The Story of the Great Lakes 

urging those who were ready to make peace to 
come, while there was yet time, to a grand council 
fire at Niagara. 

From the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi, 
from Lake Superior and eastern New York, the 
friendly tribes came up in July to Niagara. When 
Johnson stepped ashore from the boat which 
brought him from Oswego, he saw dotting the 
fields the wigwams of more than a thousand 
Indians, and in a few days the number was 
doubled. Councils were held at which the rep- 
resentatives of the tribes promised their friend- 
ship to the English, agreed to restore the forts, 
to cede lands, and in so far as their own nations 
were concerned to guarantee safe navigation on 
the lakes. This convention was the most remark- 
able assemblage of Indians that had ever gathered 
on the shores of the Great Lakes. 

While the council was in progress Colonel 
Bradstreet arrived at Niagara with his troops, 
and when it was over he proceeded up Lake Erie 
to Detroit, for Pontiac and his tribes had not 
come to the conference, and Detroit was still in 
danger. During the winter the Indians had left 
the town in peace, but in the spring warriors had 
returned to encamp on the strait and had made 



The Conspiracy of Pontiac 133 

occasional attacks. In August, 1764, fifteen 
months from the time when Pontiac and his sixty 
chiefs sat in Gladwin's council chamber, the 
English army under General Bradstreet came to 
relieve the weary garrison. Pontiac sent a mes- 
sage of defiance to the English chief, but he sent 
it from the safe distance of a village on the 
Maumee River, forty or fifty miles away, in what 
is now the state of Ohio. 

Fresh troops were put in place of the worn- 
out veterans of the siege; such Indians as re- 
mained in the vicinity came in and oflFered their 
allegiance to the English ; and Gladwin, weary of 
fighting the Indians, started down Lake Erie on his 
way to England. Now that his defence of Detroit 
was honorably ended, he was glad to resign his 
commission. Lesser posts had fallen, but Detroit 
had been saved, and with it the upper lakes. 

Pontiac spent the next two years among the 
western tribes of the Illinois region. In the sum- 
mer of 1766 he went to Oswego, and as official 
representative of the tribes of the West offered 
to Sir William Johnson his friendship and theirs. 
His conspiracy had failed and he returned sadly 
to his home in the Illinois villages. For two 
years little is known of him, but in April, 1769, 



134 The Story of the Great Lakes 

his name became once more the watchword of 
bloodshed and slaughter. From tribe to tribe 
runners carried the news that he had been mur- 
dered in an Indian village, and the nations rose in 
their wrath to avenge the death of their great 
chieftain. The Illinois nation, to which the assas- 
sin belonged, was almost wiped out, and internal 
feuds sprang up between the tribes till all the 
Indians of the southern lake region were involved, 
and the death of Pontiac was avenged among his 
people by a period of universal tribal war. 

Chronology of the Ending of French Rule 

1759. Capture of Quebec and Niagara. 

1760. Capture of Montreal and surrender of Canada. 
Taking possession of Detroit. 

1763. Pontiac' s attack, and the fall of the other posts of the 

western lakes. 
Treaty of Peace. 

1764. Sir William Johnson's conference at Niagara. 
Bradstreet's expedition up Lake Erie, and the close of 

the blockade of Detroit. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE ADVENTURES OF A TRADER 

A FUR TRADER by the name of Alex- 
ander Henry was the first Englishman 
to reach Mackinac after the fall of New 
France. His story of his adventures gives a 
graphic picture of the course of events on the 
upper lakes during the years when the siege of 
Detroit and the Indian uprising under Pontiac 
left the northern forts isolated and unprotected. 
Henry reached Fort Mackinac in September, 
1 76 1. For the latter part of his journey from 
Montreal he had adopted the disguise of a French 
trader, for the Indians stopped every party to 
inquire whether any Englishman was coming to 
the lakes. As soon as his nationality became 
known at Mackinac he was warned by the Cana- 
dians that he should lose no time in making his 
escape to Detroit, as the Indians would not tol- 
erate the presence of an Englishman. Henry 
suspected that the Canadians had fostered this 

135 



136 The Story of the Great Lakes 

spirit to retain control of the fur trade, and were 
exaggerating the dangers of his position in the 
hope of frightening him away. Still, it did not 
add to his comfort to hear that a party of Indians 
was coming to pay him a visit. As he sat in his 
house one afternoon the door opened and an 
Indian chief, six feet tall, walked quietly in. Be- 
hind him were sixty more, each with a tomahawk 
in one hand and a scalping knife in the other. 
In absolute silence they stalked into the room in 
single file, seated themselves, at a sign from their 
leader, on the floor, and began to smoke their 
pipes. In the long pause that followed Henry 
had time to study his formidable visitors. Their 
faces were painted with charcoal mixed with grease, 
and their bodies, bare to the waist, were decorated 
with white clay plastered on in various patterns. 
Some had feathers thrust through their noses ; 
others had them stuck into their hair. Unless 
their purpose was friendly these warriors would 
not be safe guests for a single trader to entertain. 
After a long time the chief began to address him. 
He told him that because of his bravery in ven- 
turing into this country alone he might stay 
among them, in spite of his being an English- 
man, the hated enemy of their father, the king of 



The Adventures of a Trader 137 

France. The august assembly ended with a 
request that the young men be allowed to taste 
his " English milk/' meaning rum, and the trader 
was assured of his safety at Mackinac. 

That week a detachment of English troops 
arrived from the lower lakes, and the trader's 
protection was ensured. Henry fitted out expedi- 
tions to go into the interior to buy furs of the 
more remote Indian tribes, and prepared to spend 
the winter at the fort. During these months at 
Mackinac and the succeeding winter which he 
spent at Sault Ste. Marie he was much interested 
in the fisheries. In both these straits the white- 
fish were very abundant. At Sault Ste. Marie in 
the late autumn there was such a run of fish that 
two men would go out in a canoe, one paddling 
and the other handling a scoop-net on the end of 
a ten-foot pole, and would return in two hours 
with a catch of five hundred whitefish, each 
weighing from six to fifteen pounds. The steers- 
man would guide the canoe in and out between 
the sharp rocks and rushing rapids ; the fisher- 
man would dip his net and throw in a pile of fish ; 
and before long the canoe would be loaded down 
to the water's edge. During the winter the fish 
were cured by drying them in smoke, and packed 



138 The Story of the Great Lakes 

for transportation to the nearest frontier posts, 
and even for the markets of the St. Lawrence. 

In May, 1763, when Henry returned to 
Mackinac, he found that the traders, who were 
gathering there,brought rumors of Indian hostility. 
These reports were disregarded by the officers of 
the garrison, who with their force of soldiers and 
their fort could not believe there was any cause 
for alarm. Henry himself received a warning. 
The year before, he had won the friendship of 
one of the Chippewa Indians, named Wawatam, 
who had surprised him one day by bringing his 
whole family to the trader's house, offering a 
present of skins, sugar, and dried meat, and de- 
claring his wish of adopting him into his family 
as a brother. Henry had accepted the honor and 
thought no more of the incident until now, in the 
spring of 1763, his Indian brother came to his 
house in a very sober mood, and begged him to 
go back to the Sault the next morning with him- 
self and his family. He further inquired whether 
the commandant of the fort had not heard bad 
news, saying that he himself had been frequently 
disturbed by "the noise of evil birds." He 
hinted that there were many more Indians about 
the fort than the English had seen. Henry paid 



The Adventures of a Trader 139 

little attention to the Indian's words, but the 
next morning he returned with his wife and once 
more entreated the trader to go with him. Henry- 
was not sufficiently familiar with the Chippewa 
language to follow all his figurative and elaborate 
speech, and unfortunately turned a deaf ear to his 
plea. After long effort the chief went sadly away. 
He had warned Henry that all the Indians were 
coming in a body one day soon to demand liquor 
of the commandant, and that before they became 
intoxicated he had better be gone. Henry kept 
careful watch, but except that a great many 
Indians came in the next day to purchase toma- 
hawks, he saw nothing unusual. The next day, 
the 4th of June, was the king's birthday, and 
from this time on we will let Henry tell his own 
story. 

"The morning was sultry. A Chippewa came 
to tell me that his nation was going to play at 
baggatiway (called by the Canadians "la crosse") 
with the Sacs, another Indian nation. He invited 
me to witness the sport, adding that the comman- 
dant was to be there, and would bet on the side of 
the Chippewas. In consequence of this Informa- 
tion, I went to the commandant and expostulated 
v/ith him a little, representing that the Indians 



140 The Story of the Great Lakes 

might possibly have some sinister end in view ; 
but he only smiled at my suspicions. 

" I did not go myself to see the match, which 
was now to be played without the fort, because, 
there being a canoe prepared to depart on the 
following day for Montreal, I employed myself 
in writing letters to my friends ; and even when a 
fellow-trader, Mr. Tracy, happened to call upon 
me, saying that another canoe had just arrived 
from Detroit, and proposing that I should go 
with him to the beach to inquire the news, it so 
happened that I still remained to finish my 
letters, promising to follow Mr. Tracy in the 
course of a few minutes. Mr. Tracy had not 
gone more than twenty paces from my door, 
when I heard an Indian war-cry, and a noise 
of general confusion. 

" Going instantly to my window, I saw a crowd 
of Indians, within the fort, furiously cutting down 
and scalping every Englishman they found. I 
had, in the room in which I was, a fowling-piece, 
loaded with shot. This I immediately seized, 
and held it for a few minutes, waiting to hear the 
drum beat to arms. In this dreadful interval, I 
saw several of my countrymen fall." 

At length, realizing that there was no hope of 



The Adventures of a Trader 141 

a call to arms, and that one person could do 
nothing against four hundred Indians, Henry- 
decided to seek shelter for himself. He saw that 
many of the Canadian inhabitants of the fort were 
calmly looking on, neither helping nor hindering 
the Indians, and conceived the hope that he 
might be safe in one of their houses. He climbed 
the low fence that separated his house from that 
of Mr. Langlade, his next neighbor, and found 
the whole family at the windows, gazing at the 
scene of blood before them. Henry begged Mr. 
Langlade to put him in some place of safety, but 
he paid no attention. " This," says Henry, " was 
a moment for despair; but the next an Indian 
woman, a slave of Mr. Langlade's, beckoned to 
me to follow her. She brought me to a door, 
which she opened, desiring me to enter, and tell- 
ing me that it led to the garret, where I must go 
and conceal myself." The woman locked the 
door after him, and from his hiding-place he 
looked out on the horrible scenes that were pass- 
ing without. Soon every one who could be 
found had been massacred, and there was a gen- 
eral cry, " All is finished." At the same instant 
Indians entered the house and asked Mr. Lang- 
lade whether there were any Englishmen in the 



142 The Story of the Great Lakes 

house. The Canadian replied that he did not 
know of any, — for the Indian woman had kept 
her secret, — but that they might hunt for them- 
selves. They were delayed in their search by a 
hunt for the key of the garret door, and in those 
few moments Henry hid himself under a pile of 
birchbark vessels. Four Indians came up with 
Mr. Langlade, walked round the dark garret so 
near to the fugitive that they might have touched 
him, told how many they had killed and how 
many scalps they had taken, and went off again, 
locking the door after them. 

Exhausted by suspense Henry fell asleep, and 
was awakened in the evening by Mrs. Langlade, 
who came up to the garret and was much sur- 
prised to find him there. She gave him a little 
water to drink and told him she hoped he would 
escape. The next morning the Indians returned, 
and discovered the trader's hiding-place. An 
Indian walked into the garret and seized him 
with one hand by the collar of his coat, while 
in the other he brandished a large carving-knife 
as if he meant to plunge it into him. For some 
seconds the Indian looked into Henry's eyes, and 
then dropped his arm, saying, " I won't kill 
you!" He added that he had once lost a brother. 



The Adventures of a Trader 143 

and that he would call his prisoner after him. 
He was going to take him to his cabin, but 
Henry begged Mr. Langlade to request that he 
be allowed to stay in the garret, as the Indians 
were so intoxicated that no Englishman would be 
safe among them. Once more the trader settled 
himself in the garret to await his fate, but in an 
hour an Indian came, purporting to be from his 
new master, and led him outside the fort among 
the bushes, where he tried to murder him. 
Henry managed to escape and ran with all speed 
to the fort, where he found his master, who gave 
him protection. The next morning three other 
Englishmen who had escaped massacre were 
brought to Mr. Langlade's house. From them 
Henry learned that the game of " la crosse " had 
been a device to get as many Englishmen as 
possible outside the walls. It had been agreed 
that a ball should be tossed as if by accident over 
the pickets of the fort, and that it should be 
instantly followed by all engaged in the game. 
When a sufficient number were inside they could 
seize the fort. Twenty Englishmen had sur- 
vived the massacre. They consulted together 
to see whether there was any hope of their regain- 
ing possession of the station, but were forced to 



144 The Story of the Great Lakes 

decide that without the help of the Canadian 
inhabitants, who could not be counted upon, it 
was impossible. 

The next day the prisoners went through a 
strange experience. They were put into canoes 
and told that they were to be taken to the Castor 
Islands in Lake Michigan, but a thick fog came 
up and their guards thought it safer to keep near 
shore and paddled towards an Ottawa village. 
Every half hour the Indians gave their war- 
whoops, one for every prisoner in the canoe, in 
order to notify all other Indians of the number 
of prisoners they were taking. At the Ottawa 
village they were greeted by an Ottawa chief, who 
made signs to them to land. When they came 
within a few hundred yards of the shore warriors 
rushed into the water, dragged the prisoners from 
the canoes, and carried them ashore. The Eng- 
Hsh thought that their last moments had come, 
but the Ottawas hastened to assure them that they 
were their friends. The Ottawas were indignant 
because they had not been consulted by the 
Chippewas about destroying the English. There- 
fore they had rescued the prisoners from the 
Chippewas, who were taking them to the Castor 
Islands to kill them. Before long the bewildered 



The Adventures of a Trader 145 

prisoners were returning to Mackinac in the 
canoes of the Ottawas, and were marched by their 
new masters into the midst of the astonished 
Chippewas. 

While their captives slept the two nations held 
a long conference, and the Ottawas were unfor- 
tunately persuaded to relinquish their grievance 
and return the prisoners to their former con- 
querors. The prospect for the Englishmen was 
now dark indeed, and several of them were to 
lose their lives that day; but as preparations 
were being made for the slaughter, Wawatam, 
Henry's adopted brother, walked into the coun- 
cil. By presents he bought the trader, — all the 
Indians recognizing his right to do so, — and 
took him away with him into the interior. There 
Henry spent the winter hunting with the Indians. 
He was often in danger from hostile tribes who 
brought tales of the siege of Detroit and sum- 
mons from Pontiac to help in the war, but his 
position in the family of Wawatam protected 
him, and in the spring of 1764 he returned with 
a party of Canadian traders to Sault Ste. Marie. 

While Henry was at the Sault a canoe arrived 
one day from Niagara. A council was assembled 
to meet the strangers and receive their message. 



146 The Story of the Great Lakes 

They proved to be the ambassadors of Sir Will- 
iam Johnson, who warned the tribes of the great 
English army that was coming, and advised them 
to hasten to Niagara to make peace. Such a 
weighty matter could not be settled by mere 
human knowledge and wisdom ; so the Indians 
made solemn preparations to consult their guid- 
ing spirit, the " Great Turtle.'' 

They built a large wigwam, within which they 
placed a small moose-skin tent for the use of the 
priest. At nightfall the whole village assembled 
in the wigwam. Several fires had been kindled 
near the tent, and their flames lighted up the 
expectant faces of this strange assemblage. The 
priest entered the tent, and as the skins fell over 
him many voices were heard. Some were barking 
like dogs, some howled like wolves, and others 
sobbed as if in pain. After a time these frightful 
sounds died away, and a perfect silence followed. 
Then a voice not heard before seemed to show 
the arrival of a new character in the tent. Henry 
describes this as "a low feeble voice, resembling 
the cry of a young puppy." When it was heard 
the Indians clapped their hands for joy, for now 
the chief spirit, the " Turtle," the spirit that 
never lied, had come to them. The others had 



The Adventures of a Trader 147 

been evil and lying voices. For half an hour 
sounds of conversation were heard from the tent, 
and then the priest spoke, saying that the " Great 
Turtle '* was come and would answer such ques- 
tions as should be asked. The chief of the 
village desired the priest to inquire whether the 
English were preparing to make war on the 
Indians, and whether there were at Fort Niagara 
large numbers of English troops. When the 
priest put these questions the tent began to shake 
violently, and soon a voice announced that the 
" Turtle " had departed. 

A quarter of an hour elapsed in silence, and 
then the voice of the " Turtle '* was heard again. 
After it had talked for some time in a language 
unintelligible to the audience, the priest gave an 
interpretation of what it had said. The spirit had, 
during its short absence, crossed Lake Huron, 
been to Fort Niagara, and thence to Montreal. 
At Fort Niagara he had seen no great number 
of soldiers, but on the St. Lawrence he had 
found the river covered with boats, and the 
boats filled with soldiers, " in number like the 
leaves of the trees," and these were coming to 
make war on the Indians. The chief had a third 
question to ask, and the spirit, " without a fresh 



148 The Story of the Great Lakes 

journey to Niagara/* gave an immediate and 
most satisfactory answer. " If/' said the chief, 
"the Indians visit Sir William Johnson, will 
they be received as friends ? " " Sir William 
Johnson,'' said the spirit, "will fill their canoes 
with presents ; with blankets, kettles, guns, gun- 
powder and shot, and large barrels of rum, such 
as the stoutest of the Indians will not be able to 
lift ; and every man will return in safety to his 
family." 

" At this," writes Henry, " the transport was 
universal; and amid the clapping of hands, a 
hundred voices exclaimed, ' I will go, too ! I 
will go, too ! ' " 

On the loth of June, Henry embarked with 
the Indian deputation of sixteen men, leaving 
the scene of his long captivity. The party went 
down Georgian Bay, across the country where 
the great Huron missions had been built to Lake 
Simcoe, and out past the site of Toronto to Lake 
Ontario. There they built canoes to take the 
place of those they had left on Georgian Bay, 
completing two large boats in two days. They 
spent their last night encamped four miles from 
Fort Niagara. In the morning the Indians 
feared to start lest they should be going into a 



The Adventures of a Trader 



149 



trap set by the English. Henry assured them 
of a friendly welcome, and at length, after paint- 
ing themselves in their gayest colors to show 
their peaceable intent, and singing the song 
which they used on going into danger, they em- 
barked. " A few minutes after," says Henry, 
" I crossed to the fort ; and here I was received 
by Sir William Johnson, in a manner for which 
I have ever been gratefully attached to his person 
and memory." 

The Indians joined in the great council, and 
Henry conferred with General Bradstreet, who 
with three thousand men was preparing to go up 
Lake Erie and raise the siege of Detroit. Brad- 
street informed him that it was his plan when he 
reached Detroit to send a body of troops to 
Mackinac, and that they should assist the trader 
to recover his property there, should he care to 
accompany them. Henry was given command 
of a corps of Indians of the upper lakes, ninety- 
six in number, who were to proceed with the 
army. Among them were the sixteen men with 
whom he had come to Niagara. Henry com- 
ments on the reversal of conditions which made 
him their leader, he " whose best hope it had 
very lately been, to live through their forbear- 



150 The Story of the Great Lakes 

ance." Most of the Indians promptly deserted, 
not caring to march against their own nation at 
Detroit, but Henry went on with Bradstreet and 
landed at Detroit on the 8th of August. He pro- 
ceeded up Lake Huron with two companies of 
troops and three hundred Canadian volunteers to 
Mackinac, where peace was concluded with the 
Indians and the fort was reoccupied by English 
soldiers. 



CHAPTER XII 

Wayne's Indian campaign 

WITH the turn of a single page of his- 
tory and the passage of a single decade 
of time, during this century of struggle 
for possession, the actors in the drama change, or 
if the same actors remain, a new set of circum- 
stances makes them play a new part amid the old 
scenes. Like the bits of glass in a kaleidoscope 
they are shaken up and come out in new com- 
binations, and with them our ideas and sympathies 
are shaken up and must be readjusted. 

We have followed the fortunes of the little 
English garrisons at Detroit and Mackinac in 
their struggles against a horde of savages, and 
have breathed a sigh of relief when a strong 
British army came to the rescue and England 
once more resumed possession of her lake posts. 
We return to Detroit in twelve years to find 
General Hamilton, the British commander of the 
French-English town, reading with scorn the 

151 



152 The Story of the Great Lakes 

announcement in a stray copy of the Pennsyl- 
vania Gazette of July, 1776, that a new American 
nation has been formed and a Declaration of 
Independence has been adopted. Within two 
years Daniel Boone, the hero pioneer, is brought 
to Detroit a British prisoner, taken by Indians 
in their raid on Kentucky, and before he has 
made his escape from prison, Hamilton is chant- 
ing the war-song and dancing the war-dance at 
a grand council of Indians. To them he is offer- 
ing his congratulations on the success of their 
raids into the southern states of the newly formed 
Union, on the number of prisoners they have 
taken, and especially on the far greater number 
of scalps they have brought. The War of the 
Revolution has begun, and with it a period of 
bloodshed in the Northwest. 

While the main bodies of troops were being 
marshalled and the decisive battles were being 
fought in the south and the east, the British 
carried on upon the western frontier an incessant 
Indian warfare. This border campaign was 
marked by a horrible series of bloody raids and 
massacres, many of which were planned at 
Niagara and Detroit. Niagara, wrested in the 
past from the Indians and the French, became 



Wayne's Indian Campaign 153 

at this time a place of refuge for the loyalists 
of New York, " a nest of Tories," and a centre 
of British influence so strong that an American 
leader could make no more telling expression 
of his dread of the threatened loss of a southern 
point of vantage than to say that it must be 
saved, for if taken by the British it would become 
" another Niagara." 

From Detroit, Hamilton set out in the summer 
of 1778 with a force of one hundred and seventy- 
five men to oust from Kaskaskia and Vincennes 
the American " rebel," George Rogers Clark, 
who had taken these British strongholds. But 
instead of returning to Detroit triumphant, 
Hamilton was taken by that same young rebel 
and started on a twelve-hundred-mile journey 
to a Virginia prison. Even after this it seemed 
to the Americans that plans and conspiracies 
came out from Detroit as fast as prisoners and 
scalps went into the British prison there. There 
were many schemes to take the fort, but all were 
abandoned because of its inaccessibility. 

When the negotiators met at Paris, in 1782, to 
arrange terms of peace between Great Britain and 
the American colonies or states, it was difficult to 
decide what should be done with the Great Lakes. 



154 The Story of the Great Lakes 

At first it was suggested that the boundary line 
between the United States and Canada should be 
so drawn as to give the territory south of the 
Ottawa River and Lake Superior to the United 
States, as far west as the Mississippi. At another 
time it was proposed that all of the land north of 
the Ohio and west of the Alleghanies should con- 
tinue to be English. Finally it was arranged 
that the Great Lakes, with the exception of 
Michigan, should form the boundary line between 
the United States and Canada in that part of the 
world. This arrangement gave to the United 
States the posts at Detroit, Mackinac, and other 
points on the lakes ; but the English would not 
surrender them, justifying their not doing so on 
the ground that the Americans had broken the 
treaty in other respects. As long as the British 
retained the posts in the Northwest, the Indians 
of that region looked to them for support and 
were inclined to take up an attitude of hostility 
to the government of the United States and to 
colonists, who now came into the Ohio Valley 
in great numbers. Treaties were made with 
them, but these the Indians failed to keep, 
and there ensued a period of confusion and 
bloodshed on the frontier. Into the details 



Wayne's Indian Campaign 155 

of this petty warfare it is not worth our while 
to enter. 

At first the British seemed anxious to preserve 
peace for the sake of the fur trade, but as time 
went on and relations between England and the 
United States became more strained, the English 
lent undisguised assistance to the Indians. It 
was inevitable that there should be constant strife 
between the rough, encroaching frontiersman who 
overstepped the original boundaries and the jeal- 
ous, suspicious Indian who met all wrongs by 
treachery and violence. The record of the years 
shows a succession of efforts for peace by the 
United States government and a series of coun- 
cils, treaties, ruptures, and hostilities on the part 
of the Indians. 

A formal government had been organized in 
the Northwest by the Ordinance of 1787, which 
created the great Northwest Territory, out of 
which were later formed the five states of Ohio, 
Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. By 
1789 and 1790 the United States government 
began to realize that it had to deal in this region 
with no petty skirmishes with scattered tribes, 
but with a widespread Indian uprising. Raids 
and counter-raids must be abandoned, and war 



1^6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

with organized armies and carefully planned cam- 
paigns must be waged against the lawless hordes 
of savages who were breaking faith with the white 
man and murdering whom they pleased. 

An expedition under the leadership of General 
Harmar, sent north in 1790 from Fort Washing- 
ton (Cincinnati), met defeat at the hands of the 
Indians at the present Fort Wayne. A similar 
expedition, commanded a year later by General 
St. Clair, was routed on a battle-ground in cen- 
tral Ohio, and the whole frontier was terrorized. 
Matters had now become serious. Armies of 
regulars had been defeated by these savage mas- 
ters of the art of treacherous warfare, and the 
Indians were becoming more and more aggressive 
in their elation at their victories, while the British 
were becoming more and more open in their sup- 
port of the lake tribes. 

Needing a leader who could drive back the 
Indians, President Washington turned to a sol- 
dier who had distinguished himself in the Revo- 
lutionary War for hard fighting and daring 
bravery. Major General Anthony Wayne had 
so often snatched success in the face of almost 
certain defeat that he had earned for himself the 
nickname " Mad Anthony." He was the grand- 



Wayne's Indian Campaign 157 

son of a Pennsylvanian pioneer and had had hard 
schooling from his Indian-fighting grandfather and 
father in the methods of frontier warfare. Above 
all else he gloried in difficulty and danger. 

In April, 1792, Washington appointed Gen- 
eral Wayne to the command of the army and sent 
him to the Ohio to drill his men. Wayne found 
there the remnant of St. Clair's force, to which 
were being constantly added hundreds of raw re- 
cruits enlisted under new legislation for the cam- 
paign by Congress. The one stipulation that 
Wayne had made when he took command was 
that he be allowed to wait to fight until his ranks 
were full and his men thoroughly trained. He 
knew that he had to deal with the same kind of 
men who had failed St. Clair. He attributed this 
failure to poor organization and lack of military 
discipline. He knew, too, that he had the added 
difficulty of meeting the paralyzing discourage- 
ment caused by previous defeats and well-remem- 
bered scenes of horror. Patiently and deliberately 
he went to work, and hew recruits arriving in the 
summer and autumn found themselves living 
in a camp where an army was being taught with 
all speed the essentials of warfare. By spring 
Wayne had twenty-five hundred soldiers who 



158 The Story of the Great Lakes 

were eager for the campaign and worthy of their 
commander. 

Congress was reluctant to begin war and kept 
Wayne waiting all through the summer of 1793, 
while it made fruitless negotiations with the In- 
dians. The tribes finally demanded that the 
Ohio River should be the boundary of Ameri- 
can advance, and to this the government could 
not agree. In October Wayne was given permis- 
sion to open his campaign, but with cautions that 
on no account was he to run any risks of defeat. 
He moved his men from Fort Washington to a 
point eighty miles north, which he fortified as 
a winter camp and named Greenville in honor of 
his former comrade at arms. Captain Nathanael 
Greene. Here he spent the winter, sending a 
large detachment of his men north to build on 
St. Clair's fatal battle-ground a fort which was 
prophetically named Fort Recovery. Several 
skirmishes with the Indians took place at Green- 
ville during the winter, and in the early summer 
a large war-party made an unsuccessful attack on 
Fort Recovery. On the 27th of July, 1794, 
General Wayne started with his " legion " of 
troops, more than two thousand men, for the 
Miami towns of northern Ohio. 



Wayne's Indian Campaign 159 

The march of the American army was watched 
with wonder and admiration by the Indians, who 
reported to the British that the soldiers went 
twice as far in a day as St. Clair's had done, that 
Wayne kept scouts out in every direction, and 
that he was always ready for attack and guarded 
carefully against ambush by day or surprise by 
night. At the junction of the Maumee and 
Auglaize rivers, where the line of hostile Indian 
villages began, Wayne built a strong log stock- 
ade which he christened with the characteristic 
name of Fort Defiance, a name perpetuated to 
this day. Warned of his approach, the Indians 
had fled, leaving their homes and their rich fields 
of corn and vegetables, in which the soldiers rev- 
elled after their hard march and short rations. 
From Fort Defiance Wayne sent a final offer of 
peace to the Indians, declaring that he would 
restore to them their lands and villages and pre- 
serve their women and children from famine 
should they agree to a lasting peace. The In- 
dians returned an evasive answer, and Wayne 
advanced against them. From scouts he learned 
that the natives were encamped near the British 
fort on the Maumee River a few miles west of the 
present city of Toledo. There were between 



i6o The Story of the Great Lakes 

fifteen hundred and two thousand warriors in 
all, with seventy rangers from Detroit, — the 
latter company being made up of French, Eng- 
lish, and other refugees. 

On the 20th of August Wayne met the 
Indians at a spot some six miles down the river, 
known as the Fallen Timbers because there a 
whirlwind had overturned the forest and left the 
trees piled across one another in rows. Wayne's 
army numbered about three thousand men, two- 
thirds of whom were regulars, and one-third 
mounted volunteers from Kentucky led by 
General Scott. At the front of the line was a 
small force of mounted volunteers, and back of 
them were the carefully placed lines of infantry 
and cavalry. The Indians were secreted as usual 
in the woods and tall grass and behind the piles 
of trees. From their shelter they poured a 
murderous fire into the ranks of the army, but 
the volunteers pressed on. The front line of 
infantry rushed up and dislodged the savages 
from their covert, the cavalry dashed over the 
rough ground and the piles of logs, and the 
Indians fled before the second line of soldiers 
could even come up to the battle-field. Of this 
engagement one of the men wrote that there was 



Wayne's Indian Campaign i6i 

not " a sufficiency of the enemy for the Legion to 
play upon." The entire action lasted less than 
forty minutes, and not a third of Wayne's force 
took part in it. The army pursued the fugitives 
two miles to the shelter of the British fort, and 
then burned everything near by. Thirty-three 
Americans were killed and one hundred wounded 
in this engagement, which closed a forty years' 
warfare with the Indians in as many minutes. 
Wayne's carefully drilled troops had won the 
most decisive victory ever gained over the 
Indians of the Northwest. 

General Wayne completed his conquest by 
marching back to Fort Recovery, and thence 
westward to the Miami towns at the junction of 
St. Mary's and St. Joseph's rivers, the scene of 
Harmar's disaster. The Indians dared offer no 
resistance, but fled before his triumphant army. 
Along his route he burned their villages, and at 
the meeting-place of the rivers he built the fort 
which was to perpetuate his name to the present 
day. Fort Wayne. Then he returned to Green- 
ville for the winter. Meanwhile the anger of 
the Indians had been stirred by the inaction of 
their British allies, who had urged them on to 
war but had furnished no troops from Detroit. 



M 



1 62 The Story of the Great Lakes 

A new respect had been called forth for the 
Americans. All the winter Wayne received at 
Greenville delegations from various Indian tribes, 
and in the summer of 1795 a formal treaty was 
signed, in which Wayne, representing the United 
States, made peace with all the western tribes. 
Eleven hundred and thirty Indians assembled, 
making a full representation from all tribes pre- 
viously hostile. Gathered about the council-fire 
and supplied with a pile of wampum strings, the 
chiefs and the American general conferred day 
after day as the various groups of Indians arrived 
during the months of June and July. The record 
of their speeches is eighty pages long and carries 
one back to the days when Champlain and Fron- 
tenac conferred with their Indian children and re- 
ceived their repentant promises of good behavior 
in the future ; but now Wayne was addressed by 
the chiefs as " Elder Brother," and he called them 
always his younger brothers. 

By the treaty of Greenville the Indians ceded 
to the United States all of what is now southern 
Ohio and southeastern Indiana, various reserva- 
tions about the forts of Detroit, Michilimackinac, 
and those which Wayne had built, a six-mile 
tract at Chicago, and a large grant of land near 



Wayne's Indian Campaign 163 

the Falls of the Ohio. The government, in its 
turn, agreed to the Indian title to the remaining 
country, and promised to pay the tribes large 
annuities. Both sides were to return all prisoners. 
Wayne, by his skill at warfare, had brought to the 
borders a peace that lasted for fifteen years, when 
new conditions brought new difficulties. 

While Wayne was fighting for the supremacy 
of the United States in the Northwest, John Jay 
was representing the government in London in 
negotiations for a treaty which should settle dis- 
puted points between the two nations, providing, 
among other things, for the settlement by a com- 
mission of any ambiguities in the boundaries and 
for the surrender of the lake posts to the Ameri- 
cans. In 1796 this treaty was ratified by Con- 
gress, and American officers were sent to take 
command of the various posts. With appro- 
priate ceremonies the Enghsh flag was lowered 
and the American Stars and Stripes were raised 
at each of the posts whose history we have fol- 
lowed under French and later under English 
control. General Wayne was sent by a grateful 
Congress to conduct the final transfer of the forts. 
After a twelve-hundred-mile journey he arrived 
at Detroit, where he was received with great 



164 The Story of the Great Lakes 

honor by Indians, English, French, and Ameri- 
cans. Leaving there in November for Presque 
Isle, he was taken with his old enemy, the gout, 
and died at that place. His remains were later 
removed by his son to Philadelphia, but a log- 
house, patterned after the one which Wayne him- 
self built there in 1790, marks to-day the place 
of his grave at the present city of Erie, Pennsyl- 
vania. 

It is worthy of note that the month before 
General Wayne started for Detroit to conclude 
the ceremonies of taking possession of that post, 
Moses Cleveland, with a party of Connecticut 
pioneers, set out to found on the shores of Lake 
Erie the city which bears his name, — the ad- 
vance guard of an army of occupation which the 
stipulations of the treaty of Greenville and 
Wayne's intimidation of the Indians made 
possible. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE GREAT LAKES IN THE WAR OF l8l2 

FROM the surrender of the northwest posts 
and the founding of Cleveland to the year 
1812, there is little to note in the history 
of the Great Lakes. The forts were gradually 
strengthened, the fur trade was continued, and a 
few settlements were made on the southern shores 
of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. Travel and 
transportation between the Atlantic seaboard and 
the Great Lakes were so difficult that few settlers 
found their way into the lake region, and there 
was no market for such agricultural products as 
were raised. In the same period the Ohio Valley 
was fast filling up, and settlers were pushing west- 
ward and northward from the Ohio River into 
central Ohio and Indiana. The ever increasing 
pressure on the Indians of that region aroused 
their fears and resentment, and made them listen 
to the plans of an able chieftain, Tecumseh, who 
banded them together in a strong league for re- 

165 



1 66 The Story of the Great Lakes 

sistance to the whites. The natives looked for aid 
to the British in Canada, but how far these had gone 
in encouraging the Indians is unknown. In 1811 
matters became so serious that General William 
Henry Harrison, Governor of Indiana Territory, 
marched against the Indians and defeated them 
in the battle of Tippecanoe. When the War of 
1 8 12 began, Tecumseh and many of his allies 
joined the British. 

The opening of the war found the lake frontier 
of the United States exposed and almost unpro- 
tected. At Fort Wayne there were eighty-five 
soldiers, at Fort Harrison (Terre Haute) fifty, 
at Fort Dearborn (Chicago) fifty-three, at Fort 
Mackinac eighty-eight, and at Detroit one hun- 
dred and twenty. The last-named post claimed 
early attention, because of its great importance, 
and also because of its exposed situation. Its loss 
to the United States would mean the loss of the 
upper lakes, at least temporarily. The problem 
was a difficult one because the United States 
had no war vessels on the lakes to secure com- 
munication between Detroit and the settlements 
on the southeastern shore of Lake Erie. Will- 
iam Hull, Governor of Michigan Territory, fully 
recognized the importance of a naval force, but 



The Great Lakes in the War of 1 8 12 167 

he was obliged to do what he could to defend 
Detroit without one. In the spring of 181 2, with 
three regiments of Ohio militia, a troop of Ohio 
dragoons, and a regiment of United States infan- 
try, — in all about sixteen hundred men, — he 
set out from the settlements in Ohio to march 
overland to reenforce this important post. The 
route lay through the wilderness, much of the 
way over swampy grounds, but the soldiers cut 
roads and advanced with a rapidity that amazed 
the British. At Frenchtown, on the River 
Raisin, forty miles below Detroit, Hull received 
word that war had been declared. Before this he 
had sent a schooner to Detroit with supplies and 
a letter to the commandant apprising him of his 
coming. This vessel was seized by the British 
soldiers stationed at Maiden, on the Canadian 
side of the Detroit River, and some distance 
below the American town. 

On the 5th of July, 1812, Hull reached De- 
troit. Besides its small garrison, the town con- 
tained about eight hundred inhabitants. It was 
defensible from Indian attacks, but was within 
gunshot of the British side of the Detroit River, 
was insufficiently supplied with provisions and 
ammunition for a siege, and was liable to be 



1 68 The Story of the Great Lakes 

completely cut off from communication with the 
United States should the British gain command 
of Lake Erie and the road along the river to the 
south. At once, Hull seized the town of Sand- 
wich, opposite Detroit, and issued a proclamation 
to the inhabitants of Canada which brought many 
of them over to the American side, but an expedi- 
tion which was to have reenforced him from 
Niagara came to naught. 

On the British side in the spring of 1812, 
affairs seemed even more gloomy, but the diffi- 
culties were overcome by the capability and cour- 
age of one man. Brigadier General Isaac Brock, 
who exercised entire command in upper Canada. 
He had at his disposal barely two thousand men, 
who were hundreds of miles from their supplies 
and scattered through several posts. When war 
seemed imminent. Brock fitted out armed vessels 
on Lake Erie and strengthened the defences of 
Maiden. The moment war was declared, he 
directed a subordinate to seize the American post 
at Michilimackinac and himself hurried with all 
available men to the Detroit River. 

Day after day the American army waited at 
Sandwich before striking a decisive blow at the 
British in their fort at Maiden. General Hull 



The Great Lakes in the War of 1812 169 

had, indeed, good reason for fear of failure, for 
although he had more men than the British, the 
English army had in its fortification a base of 
attack, and in its fleet a pronounced advantage. 
With ineffective sallies into the neighboring 
country and prolonged councils of war the days 
wore on, and the officers as well as the rank and 
file of the army became more and more dis- 
heartened. They had crossed the river July 
12. They finally set August 8 for the attack 
on Maiden ; but meanwhile word came that 
British reenforcements were on their way to the 
fort, and that a party of Indians under Tecumseh 
had captured the American supplies and mail- 
bags coming from Ohio. Prisoners of war from 
Fort Mackinac arrived at the American camp, 
announcing that their fort had been surrendered 
and that a horde of Indians were coming from 
the Northwest to attack Detroit in the rear. 
With the British garrison at Maiden increased, 
Detroit threatened by the Indians, and the line of 
communication between the American army and 
headquarters in danger, Hull saw nothing to do but 
to recross the river ; and on the night of the day 
when he had planned to attack the British fort he 
withdrew with his force to Detroit. 



lyo The Story of the Great Lakes 

Meanwhile General Brock reached Maiden, 
held a council of war at which Tecumseh with 
his following of a thousand Indians was present, 
and sent to General Hull a summons to sur- 
render. Hull refused to yield and started mes- 
sengers to recall an expedition of three hundred 
and fifty men which he had despatched under 
two Ohio colonels, MacArthur and Lewis Cass, 
to the River Raisin to rescue the necessary sup- 
plies for the army. As soon as Hull's reply was 
received two British vessels moved up the river 
to Sandwich, where their guns could cover the 
American fort. During the night Tecumseh and 
six hundred Indians crossed to the American 
side of the river and established themselves in 
the woods at a point where they could intercept 
the returning Ohio colonels with their force. On 
the morning of August i6, General Brock 
crossed the river with seven hundred soldiers. 
The British commander had intended to take up 
a position and force Hull to attack him, but 
after he reached the American bank of the 
river, he learned from Tecumseh that the Ohio 
detachment was only a few miles away. Fearing 
lest he be surrounded if he delay, Brock deter- 
mined to make an immediate attack. 



The Great Lakes in the War ofi8i2 171 

Within his tent General Hull sat debating 
what to do. Should he admit to his officers and 
men his desire to surrender at once, their undis- 
guised scorn at his previous delays would perhaps 
turn to open mutiny ; yet he felt sure that the 
fort must ultimately be taken, and he dreaded the 
loss of life and possible Indian massacre should 
he hold out. The British column began to ad- 
vance. Every soldier expected that the heavy 
American guns which were pointed toward them 
would be lighted and discharged into their midst ; 
instead, an American was seen advancing from the 
fort with a white flag. Within an hour, and with- 
out the firing of a single shot, the surprised British 
troops found themselves in possession of Detroit. 
Hull included in the terms of capitulation not 
only the troops within the fort but the Ohio de- 
tachment now advancing up the river, so that 
General Brock gained at least twenty-five hundred 
prisoners of war. The mortification of the coun- 
try at the whole course of the war vented itself 
after this surrender upon General Hull, who was 
really the victim of poor management of the army 
and lack of support at headquarters. He might 
have been forced to give up Detroit within a few 
weeks unless he was reenforced, but he could have 



172 The Story of the Great Lakes 

kept Brock from returning to harry Niagara in 
nine days. 

Detroit was surrendered on the morning of 
August 16. On the same day and at the same 
hour Fort Dearborn at Chicago was being burned 
by an Indian war-party, after the members of its 
garrison had been massacred. Two weeks earlier 
Hull had sent an order to Captain Heald, com- 
mander of the fort, to evacuate it if practicable. 
The Indian runner reached Fort Dearborn on 
August 9 with this message and with the news of 
the fall of Fort Mackinac, the receipt of which 
had been the occasion of Hull's decision in regard 
to Chicago. 

It had taken the Indian messenger a suspi- 
ciously long time to make the journey, and as 
Indians from a distance began to gather about the 
fort it was surmised that he had in some way 
learned the contents of the message, and in par- 
ticular the clause which directed that Captain 
Heald deliver up to the Indians all the public 
property of the garrison, and had told the news 
along the way. Accounts differ as to what Cap- 
tain Heald promised to the Indians. According 
to the story of Mr. Kinzie, a trader in the fort, 
Captain Heald held a council with them, at which 



The Great Lakes in the War of 1812 173 

he agreed to divide among them the public prop- 
erty at the fort on condition that they should 
furnish him with a friendly escort. Unfortunately 
the two things that the Indians most wanted were 
ammunition and liquor. These the white men 
considered it an act of madness to put into their 
hands, and under cover of night knocked in the 
heads of the barrels and poured the whiskey into 
the river, threw powder, bags of shot, and cart- 
ridges into the river, and breaking to pieces the 
muskets and pistols they could not take with them, 
dropped them into a well. An unknown writer, 
who was present at the time, distinctly states that 
Heald objected to this act and argued that it was 
a bad thing to lie to an Indian. The watchful 
Indians found out what had been done, and from 
that time on the older chiefs were unable to re- 
strain the anger of their young men. So many 
Indians had gathered that the officers became 
convinced that the tribes had been notified by the 
messenger from Detroit as he made his trip of the 
distribution of gifts that was to take place. The 
supply of blankets, paints, calicoes, and trinkets 
that were given out did not satisfy the warriors. 

On the evening of the 13th of August the 
garrison was cheered by the arrival from Fort 



174 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Wayne of Captain William Wells, a famous In- 
dian fighter and uncle of Mrs. Heald, the com- 
mander*s wife. This man had had a most roman- 
tic life. Born in Kentucky, he had been stolen 
when a boy of twelve by the Indians and adopted 
by a chief of the Miamis, whose daughter he had 
married. He had grown up with the Indians 
and fought their battles with them as a matter of 
course, taking part in the engagements with Gen- 
eral Harmar and General St. Clair. Discovered 
by his Kentucky kindred and convinced that he 
was brother of Captain Samuel Wells, he had been 
persuaded after a time to return to his own people. 
He had bidden his Indian father-in-law a dra- 
matic farewell, telling him that in the past they had 
been friends, but henceforth they must be ene- 
mies ; but as a matter of fact he had always kept 
in friendly relation with his former chief and had 
on one occasion saved his family from being taken 
prisoners. He had been one of Wayne's most 
valuable scouts, and had since occupied the posi- 
tion of Indian agent, first at Chicago and now at 
Fort Wayne, where he was living with his Indian 
wife. Hearing of the probable evacuation of 
Fort Dearborn he had marched thither with all 
haste, bringing a party of thirty friendly Miamis 



The Great Lakes in the War ofi8i2 175 

in the hope that he could be of assistance to 
his friends and especially to his favorite niece, 
Mrs, Heald. 

On the morning of the 15th of August, at nine 
o'clock, the soldiers left the fort for their journey 
of two hundred and eighty miles to Detroit. 
Without a sign of ill-feeling the Indians bade 
them good-by, and the little party started along 
the lake shore. Captain Wells with half his Mi- 
amis, all mounted on Indian ponies, led the line. 
The soldiers of the garrison with the wagons, in 
which sat the twelve women and twenty children, 
followed directly behind them, and the remainder 
of the friendly Miamis brought up the rear. 
The escort of five hundred furnished by the 
neighboring tribes kept abreast of the troops until 
they reached the sand-hills, a quarter of a mile 
from the fort. There they struck out suddenly 
into the prairie and disappeared, hurrying forward 
to prepare an ambuscade. 

The little company had proceeded about a 
mile and a half when Captain Wells was seen to 
turn and ride back, swinging his hat in a circle 
above his head, which, in the sign language of 
the frontier, meant : " We are surrounded by 
Indians." As he came nearer he shouted, "We 



176 The Story of the Great Lakes 

are surrounded. March up on the sand ridges.'* 
All at once, in the language of Mrs. Heald, who 
left a graphic report, they saw " Indians' heads 
sticking up and down again here and there, like 
turtles out of water." As the member of the 
party most experienced in Indian warfare. Captain 
Wells was immediately put in command. He 
led the men in a charge up the bank, and with a 
volley of shot they broke the line of the Indians. 
A second time they charged, and again the In- 
dians drew back. But though they were beaten 
in front, they poured in from all sides, captured 
the horses and baggage, and began to kill the 
women and children. For fifteen or twenty 
minutes the fight went on. Captain Wells was 
here, there, and everywhere. With two pistols 
and a gun, which he kept reloading with light- 
ning rapidity, he sighted and brought down the 
warriors in the midst of their wanton work. 

Wounded himself and isolated on a mound 
with a remnant of his men. Captain Heald saw 
that there was no hope but to surrender. The 
Indians made signs for him to approach them, 
and he offered to surrender in the hope of sparing 
further bloodshed. His own wife was slightly 
wounded, and Mrs. Helm, the wife of his lieu- 



The Great Lakes in the War of 1 8 12 177 

tenant, had only been saved from being toma- 
hawked by the friendly chief. Black Partridge, 
who seized her from the grasp of her captor, and 
took her to the water, where he made feint to 
drown her, but kept her head out until the fight 
was over. After the surrender Captain Wells 
rode up, desperately wounded, to send farewell 
messages to his wife, and was killed on the in- 
stant by a group of Indians, who mangled his 
body horribly. Of the ninety-three in the party 
but thirty -six were still living. Of the sixty-six 
fighting men forty-three had been killed, and 
only seven women and six children survived. 
Some of the prisoners made their escape, finding 
their way to safety through a series of hairbreadth 
adventures ; some died in captivity, and others 
were exchanged at intervals during the next two 
years. On the spot where the massacre took 
place, — then out in open prairie, now at the foot 
of Eighteenth Street in the city of Chicago, — there 
stands a noble monument to the Fort Dearborn 
garrison. 

With Fort Dearborn and Fort Mackinac aban- 
doned, the last American defences on the west- 
ern lakes were gone. The boundary line of the 
United States became the Wabash and Maumee 

N 



lyS The Story of the Great Lakes 

rivers, and the surrender of Detroit made it 
doubtful whether even that line could be 
maintained. The hold of the United States on 
the Great Lakes in August, 1812, looked very- 
uncertain. 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE CONQUEST OF LAKE ERIE 

THE year 1813 began with another dis- 
aster for the United States. After the 
surrender of Detroit, Governor William 
Henry Harrison, of the Indiana Territory, placed 
himself at the head of a popular movement to 
retrieve the defeat at any cost and to recover 
Detroit. It was winter before he succeeded in 
getting an army within reach of the lake coast. 
For months the three divisions of his force of ten 
thousand men struggled through the swampy 
lands of Ohio, where the movement of troops 
and of necessary provisions was rendered well- 
nigh impossible by the heavy rains. On the 
15th of January two Frenchmen had entered 
the camp of the advance division of the army, 
which under command of General Winchester was 
establishing itself at a point on the Maumee River 
twenty miles inland from Lake Erie. They urged 
the troops to occupy Frenchtown, a village on the 

179 



i8o The Story of the Great Lakes 

American shore of Lake Erie but within British 
lines. This town on the River Raisin was held by 
Canadians and Indians, and its loss, if taken by the 
Americans, would be a serious blow to the British. 
Six hundred and fifty men, the flower of the Ken- 
tucky regiments, started under the command of 
Colonel Lewis for the attack. After considerable 
losses the Americans seized the town. General 
Winchester hastened to their support with three 
hundred more men, making a total American force 
at the River Raisin of eight or nine hundred men. 
General Proctor, Brock's successor at Fort 
Maiden, had under his command over two thou- 
sand soldiers. On the morning of January 22, 
1 8 13, he crossed the lake on the ice with a force 
of six hundred men and from six to eight hun- 
dred Indians and attacked the Americans in the 
ill-fortified village. When the hard-fought en- 
gagement was ended four hundred Americans 
were missing, either killed during the battle 
by the British or scalped by the Indians in the 
horrible massacre that followed the defeat. Only 
after the ammunition had given out and retreat 
had been proved impossible because of the deep 
snow and the position of the enemy, did the 
last of the gallant Kentuckians surrender. "Re- 



The Conquest of Lake Erie i8i 

member the River Raisin " became the watch- 
word of a desperate people, and operations on 
the Great Lakes were suspended until Commo- 
dore Perry was ready with his navy to retrieve 
these defeats and turn the tide of American 
fortune. 

Oliver Hazard Perry had been brought up in 
the naval service. His father was a gallant sea- 
man who had fought in the Revolution and been 
on the sea ever since. When Oliver was ready he 
was appointed midshipman on his father's ship, 
and had seen since that day service in the West 
Indies, in the Tripolitan war, and off the Atlan- 
tic coast. At the beginning of the War of 1812 
he was put in charge of a flotilla of gun-boats 
stationed at Newport, but he had petitioned to 
be removed from this retirement and placed in 
active service, preferably on the lakes. He was 
summoned in the winter of 18 13 to take charge 
of the construction of vessels on Lake Erie. He 
found the lake fleet divided. At the Black 
Rock Navy Yard on the Niagara River lay sev- 
eral vessels, unable to get out past the British 
fleet and the overlooking British forts. At Erie, 
Pennsylvania, two brigs, a schooner, and a gun- 
boat were being built. It was for Perry to unite 



1 82 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the two sections of the fleet, to provide them 
with a crew of able seamen, and to force the 
British fleet into decisive action. 

An American victory on the Niagara River 
on the 27th of May set free the vessels at Black 
Rock. Perry was on hand to superintend their 
laborious removal from the navy-yard. Oxen 
and men worked day after day dragging the 
vessels against the heavy current of the river into 
Lake Erie. Once on the waters of the lake 
the American ships under Perry's command 
evaded the British cruisers which were sail- 
ing back and forth between Niagara and Erie, 
with the sole purpose of intercepting them, 
and reached the latter port in safety. For 
two months the fleet lay in that harbor while 
Perry strained every nerve to get the vessels 
into shape and secure sailors to man them. 
We get a little idea of his difficulties by the fact 
that between the last of May and the first of 
August he cut down his requirements in the num- 
ber of seamen to one-half his original estimate. 
On the sixth day of August all preparations were 
completed and the fleet sailed out on Lake Erie. 

Commodore Perry was twenty-eight years old ; 
his antagonist, Barclay, was thirty-two. Barclay 



The Conquest of Lake Erie 183 

had met as many difficulties as Perry in getting 
his fleet ready, and especially in securing pro- 
visions for his men. The American squadron 
hadj moreover, cut off communication between 
Fort Maiden and its source of supplies. So in 
September, even though his best vessel, the 
Detroity had to be launched unfinished from the 
stocks, Barclay saw no choice but to fight at once. 
Early on the morning of September 9, the British 
fleet sailed to meet the American squadron, which 
was anchored at the mouth of the Sandusky River. 
Barclay had six vessels with sixty-three guns, 
and probably about four hundred and fifty men. 
Perry had nine vessels with fifty-four guns, and 
about the same number of available men. His 
guns, however, were much heavier, and his 
vessels larger. 

At daybreak of September 10, Perry's look- 
out discovered the approaching British fleet; the 
American ships at once weighed anchor. In twelve 
minutes they were under sail and standing toward 
the enemy. The wind was light and the lake 
calm, so that both sides found difficulty In getting 
Into position, but by noon they were drawn up 
for battle. The British vessels were in a single 
column, the American In a somewhat more Irregu- 



184 The Story of the Great Lakes 

lar formation, and each vessel opposed one of its 
own tonnage and build in the enemy's fleet. 
Barclay commanded the Detroit, a ship of four 
hundred and ninety tons carrying nineteen guns, 
and opposite him was Perry's flagship, the Law- 
rence, with twenty guns. At a quarter before 
twelve the British opened fire, and the Americans 
replied. 

Finding the British fire at long range very 
destructive, especially to his own vessel, Perry 
set more sail and passed the word by hail of 
trumpet for the whole line to close up and ad- 
vance nearer the enemy. For two hours the 
fleets manoeuvred in this position, the Lawrence 
within two hundred and fifty yards of the Detroit 
and both vessels pouring a heavy fire into each 
other. A second vessel, the ^een Charlotte, 
came to the support of Barclay, and Perry's flag- 
ship, after sustaining the action for over two 
hours, was seriously disabled. Every gun was 
rendered useless, the greater part of the crew 
killed or wounded, and the rigging shot away. 
At 2.30 the English commander saw the Law- 
rence drop from her position and a small boat 
pass from her to the Niagara, a vessel under com- 
mand of Lieutenant Elliot, which had been at 



The Conquest of Lake Erie 185 

some distance from the main engagement and was 
at this time comparatively fresh. As Barclay- 
wrote in his official report, " The American com- 
modore, seeing that as yet the day was against 
him, made a noble and, alas ! too successful an 
effort to regain it; for he bore up [in the Ni- 
agara^ and supported by his small vessels, 
passed within pistol-shot and took a raking posi- 
tion on our bow/' Up to this time the result 
of the action had been in doubt. For some rea- 
son the portion of the fleet under Elliot had pur- 
sued an independent course, and Perry with the 
vessels nearest him had been too hard pressed. 
A bitter dispute as to the cause of this condition 
was waged by Elliot's friends in the ensuing years 
after the close of the war. Whatever the reason, 
it was evident to all that the American force was 
not in its most eflFective position because so many 
of the vessels were fighting at long range instead 
of at close. When Elliot came up near enough 
to the disabled flagship to allow Perry to go on 
board, the advantage was for the first time on 
the American side. Perry was able to bear down 
on the Detroit and pour into her volleys of shot 
so that, with American vessels on every side aid- 
ing in the attack, she soon became completely 



1 86 The Story of the Great Lakes 

disabled. The topmasts and rigging were cut 
away, the hull was shattered, and the vessel be- 
came unmanageable. Within half an hour the 
British commander was forced to strike his flag 
and surrender. 

It had been a desperate alternative for Com- 
modore Perry to venture into a small boat and 
transfer his flag from one ship to another. By 
his personal action in thus rushing his own vessel 
in at the crisis and exposing himself to a fusillade 
from the enemy for several minutes before he 
could make any reply to it. Perry had won the 
battle for the Americans. He determined to re- 
ceive the surrender on his original flagship, the 
Lawrence, at whose peak had been flying through- 
out the battle the words spoken a few months 
before by the hero for whom the vessel was 
named, the dying commander of the Chesapeake, 
" Don't give up the ship." Perry returned to 
the ship and the English officers came to him 
there. Each presented his sword, and in reply 
Perry bowed and requested that their side-arms 
be retained by the officers. The deck of the 
Lawrence was covered with dead and wounded. 
On both sides the battle had been very hard- 
fought, and the loss of life, both of officers and 



The Conquest of Lake Erie 187 

men, was very heavy. Out of one hundred and 
three men on the Lawrence twenty-two had been 
killed and sixty-one wounded. On both the flag- 
ships every officer save Perry was killed or 
wounded, even Barclay being seriously injured, 
and the loss on these vessels was probably four- 
fifths of the men disabled or killed. When the 
ceremony of surrender was over, Perry tore off 
the back of an old letter, and using his hat for a 
writing-desk, wrote to General Harrison, stationed 
with reenforcements on the Sandusky River : 
" We have met the enemy, and they are ours ; 
two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one 
sloop." 

Perry's victory was immediately followed up 
both by himself and by General Harrison. Within 
a week the remnant of the fleet was ready to con- 
vey land forces to Maiden, where they disem- 
barked on the 27th of September. The timidity 
and incompetence of the British general, Proctor, 
gave the Americans a great advantage. To the 
utter scorn of Tecumseh and his Indians, who 
were supporting the British, General Proctor 
evacuated Maiden, Detroit, and Sandwich without 
a stroke in their defence, and retired along the 
road to Lake Ontario even before the Americans 



1 88 The Story of the Great Lakes 

landed. With such a start Harrison thought 
that the English with their thousand horses would 
be out of his reach, but he prepared to follow 
them. This Proctor seems not to have included 
in the range of possibilities. 

By easy marches the British proceeded to 
Chatham, fifty miles from Sandwich on the River 
Thames. Here Proctor halted the army while 
he himself went on to the Moravian town twenty- 
six miles beyond. The American army appeared, 
and the British tried to follow their commander 
to Chatham. The organization of the whole 
army was by this time completely demoralized. 
They had, however, no choice but to turn and 
fight, as the younger officers and soldiers had 
long desired. The British were so stationed as 
to give the advantage of position to their oppo- 
nents ; and the American force was strengthened 
by a mounted regiment commanded by Richard 
Johnson, who had won a great reputation for 
himself and his men in previous battles on the 
frontier. The Americans lost only fifteen men 
in the engagement, with thirty wounded. The 
British list of dead and wounded was also short, 
but nearly five hundred were taken prisoners, and 
their supply of provisions and ammunition fell 



The Conquest of Lake Erie 189 

into the hands of the Americans. Only two hun- 
dred of this whole division of the British army 
returned to report at headquarters a month later. 
The Indian warrior, Tecumseh, was killed in this 
battle, and with his death the remote prospect of 
an Indian confederacy was gone. After these 
two victories the western Indians fell away from 
their alliance with the British and took no 
active part in the war. 

The last year of the war, the year 18 14, was 
marked by constant and active operations on Lake 
Ontario and about Niagara. The naval move- 
ments were not particularly effective on the Ameri- 
can side, nor did they win great results. The 
possession of the Niagara River was sharply 
contested, and the American troops distinguished 
themselves by their bravery at the battles of 
Chippewa Creek and Lundy's Lane. Cut off 
from any other lake position, the British could 
concentrate their forces at this point and throw 
the Americans on the defensive. These battles 
concerned, nevertheless, only a small portion 
of the Great Lakes, which were again the 
northern boundary of the United States. By 
Perry's victory on Lake Erie, the subsequent 
recovery of the Detroit River, and the defeat 



190 The Story of the Great Lakes 

of the British army at the Thames, Lake Erie 
and the whole Northwest were saved to the 
United States. The close of the war by the 
treaty of Ghent in the winter of 18 14 brought 
to the lake frontier a well-earned and a lasting 
peace. 



CHAPTER XV 

GENERAL LEWIS CASS AND REORGANIZATION 

A PERIOD of conflict always leaves behind 
it changed and unsettled conditions. 
Between the close of a war and the 
final readjustment of affairs leading up to a set- 
tled and permanent life, there must be a time of 
reorganization. Into this period of reconstruc- 
tion the western territory about the Great Lakes 
passed at the close of the War of 1 812. Since 
the Ordinance of 1787 the Northwest Territory 
had been subdivided. Ohio had become a state 
in 1802, and the region west of it had all been in- 
cluded in a territory under the general name of In- 
diana, of which section William Henry Harrison 
was the first governor. From Indiana, in its turn, 
Michigan was set off in 1805, with WilHam Hull 
as its first governor. On Hull's retirement from 
public life, after the surrender of Detroit, Colonel 
Lewis Cass was appointed governor of Michigan 
Territory. As the man who had most influence 

191 



192 The Story of the Great Lakes 

on the Northwest during these years of recon- 
struction. Governor Cass deserves detailed notice. 

Born in Exeter, New Hampshire, in 1782, Lewis 
Cass was the son of a soldier of the Revolution. 
During his son's boyhood Major Cass, the father, 
was with Anthony Wayne or in command of 
Fort Hamilton, and after the peace of Greenville 
he brought his family, as did so many of the 
soldiers, to the rich country through which he had 
marched in war time. The young man divided 
his time between Marietta, where he began the 
study of law, and the frontier, where his father was 
hewing a home and making a living out of the 
wilderness. Under the state constitution of Ohio 
the first certificate of admission to the bar was 
given in 1802 to Lewis Cass. In the school of 
the county court the young lawyer gained a first- 
hand knowledge of the practice of the law and 
an understanding of the people of the frontier and 
how to deal with them, both of which served him 
well in his governorship. Even before he reached 
the proper age of eligibility he was sent to the 
Ohio legislature, and at the outbreak of the War 
of 1 8 12 he was given a colonel's commission. 

Cass was one of the three Ohio colonels who 
served with Hull in the ill-starred Detroit expe- 



General Lewis Cass and Reorganization 193 

dition. Indeed, he led one of the few successful 
minor charges of that campaign. To his great 
indignation he was included by his general in that 
surrender, although he was not at the fort. For 
some months he was prisoner of war on parole. 
As soon as he was released he joined Harrison, 
under whom he did such efficient service that 
Harrison left him after the battle of the Thames 
in command of Detroit and the northwest fron- 
tier. The President soon appointed Cass gov- 
ernor of Michigan Territory, which then included 
only the lower peninsula of the present state, but 
to which the territory that is now Wisconsin was 
added in 18 18 under the name of the Huron 
District. 

Indiana became a state two years after the close 
of the war, but as governor of Michigan Territory 
and superintendent of Indian affairs General Cass 
had control of all Indian posts in the Northwest, 
as well as of the whole of Michigan, Wisconsin, 
and northern Illinois. Illinois became a state 
in 1818, but at that time the only recognized 
settlements were in the southern portion of the 
territory, and the region about Chicago was prac- 
tically left to the care of General Cass. The 
management of this vast territory presented many 



194 The Story of the Great Lakes 

difficulties. The governor's immediate residence, 
Detroit, was four-fifths Canadian, and of this 
population a large proportion was French. It 
was only fifty years since Major Gladwin had 
taken possession of a Detroit that was wholly 
French, and when the Americans took command 
in 1796 they had found a large predominance of 
French-Canadians. These settlers were in the 
best of times poor farmers, and in war times they 
had stopped all attempts to cultivate the land. 
Governor Cass found among them the most 
absolute ignorance of the rudimentary prin- 
ciples of farming that he had ever encountered. 
They used one piece of ground, without the least 
attempt to fertilize, until it was exhausted, and 
then proceeded to another. As these settlers of 
Detroit were typical of the more scattered inhabit- 
ants of the region, and as the Indians were 
almost entirely dependent on the gifts and sup- 
plies of the ruling people, Cass found himself 
confronted by the problem of how to feed a starv- 
ing territory. For its immediate need he sought 
and obtained government bounties for the people. 
For the remedy of the condition he did every- 
thing in his power to stimulate settlement, urging 
thci government to survey the land and allot por- 



General Lewis Cass and Reorganization 195 

tions for sale. In this he was hindered by the 
false reports of the first surveyors, who for some 
reason represented the whole of Michigan as so 
swampy, barren, or otherwise unfit for cultivation 
that there could be no incentive to immediate 
settlement. This, be it remembered, was said of 
Michigan, whose rich bottom-lands, fertile prai- 
ries, and timber tracts were soon to be so pro- 
ductive and whose orchards were to become 
among the greatest fruit producers of the states. 
Cass did everything in his power to counteract 
these statements and to further immigration. 
Occupation of the land by thrifty settlers would 
solve the difficulties by making the inhabitants 
independent as they became capable of producing 
what they needed, and would also lessen their 
isolation by creating lines of communication with 
the East. In these efforts he was successful. A 
public sale of lands was held in 18 18, and by 1820 
the population had nearly doubled since before 
the war. The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 
brought in a period of rapid immigration in which 
Cass began to see the fulfilment of his hopes. 
The population jumped from nine thousand in 
1820 to thirty-two thousand in 1830. This 
came just before he was called to the position of 



196 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Secretary of War at Washington. During his 
period of national service he had the satisfaction 
of seeing his territory flooded with newcomers, till 
in 1837 it entered the Union as a state with one 
hundred and seventy-five thousand inhabitants. 
It was due to the statesmanship of its governor 
that Michigan Territory was so well-ordered and 
well-developed a region and was therefore so soon 
ready for statehood. He educated the original 
settlers to self-government, organized courts and 
legislative assemblies and guided their policies, 
and furthered the cause of public education. 
During the eighteen years of his governorship he 
devoted himself to such service with a zeal that 
won immediate results. 

In his double position as governor and super- 
intendent of Indian affairs, Cass did much else for 
the western lake region. Even after the cessation 
of hostilities, he found the British attitude hostile 
and aggravating. This showed itself in two ways. 
The British were inclined to ignore the rights of 
the United States citizens and to interfere with 
their liberty when the proximity of the two 
nations brought up any disputed question ; they 
also stirred the Indians to hostility. Governor 
Cass stood out boldly, insisting that the United 



General Lewis Cass and Reorganization 197 

States must be treated according to the customs 
of international law between two equal powers. 
In time the British came to realize that they were 
dealing with a nation, not with a detached and 
feeble territory. Governor Cass could not handle 
so openly the British instigation of the Indians 
to hostility toward the United States and its 
western settlers. There was no law to prevent 
the distribution of sixty tons of presents among 
the Indians who gathered at Maiden from the 
American as well as from the Canadian side of 
the river. The British did not realize that the 
time had come for them to give up their guardian- 
ship of all Indian tribes who did not live within 
their lawful jurisdiction. 

In the conduct of Indian affairs Governor Cass 
showed himself skilled as no leader had been since 
the days of the wise French explorers. The 
Indians had never forgotten the French mission- 
aries. " Seven generations/' said a Chippewa 
chief, " have passed since the Frenchmen came to 
these falls (Sault Ste. Marie), but we have not 
forgotten them. Just, very just, were they to us." 
This spirit of fairness now returned in Governor 
Cass, who combined with it an insight into In- 
dian character, a patience that enabled him to deal 



198 The Story of the Great Lakes 

with the savages, and an energy which made him 
go to endless trouble to arrange matters with 
them. The work of this wonderful man held off 
raids and massacres, — if not open and continued 
war, — which would have retarded settlement in 
this exposed wilderness for many years. If the 
white men were to occupy the greater part of the 
country, agreements must be made and kept with 
the Indians. Cass recognized this as his cardinal 
principle, and began to act on it even before the 
close of the war. He first made treaties with the 
Indians near Detroit. From this centre the circle 
widened until it included the whole of his vast 
territory and parts of more settled regions. At 
St. Mary's in Ohio, at Saginaw in Michigan, and 
at Chicago in Illinois, he concluded treaties which 
brought to the United States vast stretches of 
valuable territory. 

With the permission of the government Cass 
organized an expedition to go into the remote 
sections of its northwestern possessions, investi- 
gate their resources, and come into friendly rela- 
tions with the Indians. Of this picturesque and 
important expedition made by twenty Americans 
into the then unknown Lake Superior country 
Mr. Schoolcraft, one of his scientific companions. 



General Lewis Cass and Reorganization 199 

has left us a full account. In every transaction 
the figure of Cass stands out strong and forceful. 
At Sault Ste. Marie he wanted to obtain a piece 
of ground which through old British and French 
treaties the Indians had previously admitted to 
belong to the white men. Adorned with British 
medals the Indians greeted him with an indepen- 
dence of word and gesture that soon became open 
rudeness and impudence. Retiring from the 
council the chiefs ran up the British flag on their 
lodge and cleared the room in preparation for 
battle. Governor Cass, with a single interpreter, 
walked into the Indian camp, tore down the 
British flag, and faced the astonished savages. 
The Americans were studious, he said, to render 
justice and promote peace with the Indians, but 
the flag was the distinguishing token of national 
power, and two could not fly over the same spot. 
The Indians were forbidden to raise any flag but 
the American, and if they should the United 
States would put strong feet on their necks and 
crush them to earth. With these words he turned 
and walked out of the lodge with the British flag 
in his hand. In a few hours the Indians signed 
the treaty, and the expedition proceeded on its 
way. 



200 The Story of the Great Lakes 

At the request of Cass mineralogists and geol- 
ogists had been sent with him, and they made 
such discoveries as he had expected of copper and 
other minerals. So valuable were they that the 
attention of the whole United States was turned 
toward this rich region. Part of the company, 
led by Cass, returned by way of Chicago, a village 
of only ten or twelve houses outside the limits of 
a well-garrisoned fort, but with a location in what 
seemed to Cass " the most fertile and beautiful 
country that could be imagined." 

Six years later Cass was back on Lake Supe- 
rior making on the site of Duluth important 
treaties with the tribes of Wisconsin and Minne- 
sota. In all these treaties with the Indians he 
insisted on three points. The chiefs should 
understand fully what they were doing ; just 
remuneration should be made by the Americans ; 
and the promises made should be faithfully ob- 
served on both sides. The flag that he carried 
into the lake region remained during his adminis- 
tration the symbol of justice and honor, and won 
the respect of all. 



CHAPTER XVI 



THE BLACK HAWK WAR 



THE settlement of northern Illinois and 
Wisconsin by American colonists brought 
on in 1832 the last serious Indian out- 
break in the lake region. The white men had 
been pushing the Indians farther and farther 
west. On the banks of the Mississippi the red 
men turned and made a desperate attempt to 
keep possession of the lands which held the 
homes and the graves of their ancestors. 

Between Rock River in lUinois and the Wis- 
consin River there lay on the eastern bank of 
the Mississippi a region which had been known 
to the white men ever since the visit of Nicholas 
Perrotin 1690 because of its extensive deposits of 
lead. Mines had been worked there by the 
Indians and Frenchmen for two centuries and 
had yielded a considerable output, which had 
been bought by French-Canadian traders and in 
later years by the British. The United States 



201 



202 The Story of the Great Lakes 

concluded in 1804 a treaty with the Sauk and 
Fox Indians, who occupied this country, by 
which they ceded to the Americans the territory 
east of the Mississippi River from the mouth of 
the Illinois at the south to the mouth of the 




FBOM 

LAKE MICHIGAN 

TO 

THE MISSISSIPPI 



Wisconsin at the north. It had been agreed that 
so long as the lands remained the public property 
of the United States the Indians might live and 
hunt there, but when they were bought by 
settlers the Indians must move. 

American mining settlements sprang up after 
the close of the War of 1812, and by 1827 an 
established coach road, known as Kellogg's Trail, 



The Black Hawk War 203 

ran from Peoria one hundred and twenty miles 
north to Galena, which was in the heart of the 
mining country. Along this road were occasional 
groups of cabins, while on either side trails ran 
off into the wilderness which would have led the 
traveller who followed them to solitary home- 
steads and well-ordered farms. In a rich and 
fertile tract at the mouth of Rock River stood the 
chief village of the Sauks. It was one of the 
largest and most prosperous Indian towns on 
the continent, with more than five hundred fami- 
lies, and was besides the principal cemetery of 
the nation. Squatters seized the Indian fields, 
built their huts on their clearings, and stole their 
harvests. Until the lands were formally sold the 
Indians had a right there, and their complaints 
were just. In 1828, however, the site of the vil- 
lage was sold, and the tribes were given notice to 
leave. Keokuk, the chief of the Sauks, crossed 
the Mississippi with the majority of the tribe and 
counselled the rest to yield peaceably. A consid- 
erable number of the Indians remained in the set- 
tlement, living on the high bluff which has since 
been known as Black Hawk's Watch Tower, and 
cultivating the few fields which remained to them. 
Black Hawk was one of the Indians who did 



204 The Story of the Great Lakes 

not share Keokuk's submissive temper of mind. 
He was a warrior about sixty years of age, who 
seems always to have been a restless and discon- 
tented member of the tribe. He was a tall, 
spare man, with pinched features, high cheek- 
bones, and a prominent Roman nose. His 
black eyes were piercing ; he had practically no 
eyebrows, and his hair had been plucked out 
save for a single scalp-lock, in which on occasions 
was fastened a bunch of eagle feathers. He was 
a striking figure, and his history bore out in 
interest his appearance. He had begun his war- 
like career in early youth. Before he was fifteen 
he had won in his tribe the rank of a brave, and 
at that age the scalping of an enemy had gained 
him the coveted right to paint, to wear feathers, 
and to dance the war-dance. Since that time he 
had been involved in every tribal skirmish that 
had taken place, and he had played a prominent 
part in the white men's wars. 

In the unsettled period before the War of 1812, 
Black Hawk had gathered about him a group of 
two hundred young warriors, who won for them- 
selves in the war the name of the " British Band," 
from their support of the British troops. He 
had fought at the battle of Frenchtown on the 




Black Hawk 



The Black Hawk War 205 

River Raisin, at the battle of the Thames under 
Tecumseh, and after the latter's death he returned 
to IlHnois and carried on there a border warfare 
which was only ended by his signing at St. Louis 
in 18 16 a treaty of peace. Since that time he had 
made the Rock River village his headquarters, 
and when the white men began to take up his 
lands, his smouldering hatred of the Americans 
blazed out. Returning with a band of warriors 
from the winter hunting season of 1831, he was 
warned off his land. He refused to cross the 
Mississippi River, and appealed to the Indians 
to defend the graves of their ancestors. In 
spite of Keokuk's remonstrances the best young 
men of the Sauk and Fox tribes flocked to his 
standard, and his threats excited such alarm 
among the settlers that Governor Reynolds of 
Illinois issued a call for volunteers to assist the 
regular troops in guarding the frontier. There 
was a prompt response, and when the troops 
reached Black Hawk's village the Indians with- 
drew during the night to the west side of the 
river and signed a treaty never to return to their 
former homes without the express permission of 
the United States authorities. 

Black Hawk did not abide by this treaty. 



2o6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

During the winter of 1832 he recruited a large 
force, and in the spring he crossed the Mississippi 
at a point just south of his former village, and 
began a march up the Rock River Valley. This 
invasion of the state by a hostile band of savages 
excited great alarm along the frontier. The 
settlers came in from their lonely farms 
and built about the larger villages stockades and 
defences. A call for volunteers was issued, and 
the enthusiastic response was a surprise, even to 
the governor who summoned them. 

One of the first to enlist was Abraham Lincoln, 
an Illinois citizen of two years' standing. He 
had come with his family in his seventh year from 
Kentucky to Indiana and thence in 1830 to the 
newer settlements of Illinois. He was twenty- 
three years old, and was a tall, sturdy backwoods- 
man, who was to prove himself in the wrestling 
matches that were the soldiers' pastime, the 
strongest man but one in the whole army. He 
was at once chosen captain of his company, an 
honor which brought him more gratification than 
most of his greater successes. The volunteers 
were organized into four regiments, and started 
to follow Black Hawk up the Rock River. 
The command of four hundred regulars was given 



The Black Hawk War 207 

to Colonel Zachary Taylor, afterwards President of 
the United States ; and during the months of this 
war there served in the army Robert Anderson, 
the defender of Sumter, Winfield Scott, Albert 
Sidney Johnston, the Confederate hero, and 
Jefferson Davis. It was a distinguished group of 
men who responded in their youth to the call of 
their country. 

The marching was difficult. There were no 
roads or bridges, only marshy trails and streams 
swollen into torrents by the spring thaws. But 
the hardy backwoodsmen were used to such con- 
ditions. They marched steadily on, and when 
they had gone some ninety miles up Rock River 
to Dixon's Ferry halted to await the arrival of 
General Atkinson with the regular troops and the 
loads of provisions. They found there two bat- 
talions of horsemen, under the command of 
Majors Stillman and Bailey, which had been 
gathered in the upper country. They had had 
no long march to weary them, but were impatient 
to get a chance at the enemy. They set off as 
scouts on a dark, threatening morning in May, 
with orders to coerce what Indians they met into 
submission. " I thought," says the governor in 
his memoirs, " they might discover the enemy." 
And they did. 



2o8 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Black Hawk had been urging the tribes of the 
Rock River region to join him, but had received 
so Httle encouragement that he was almost pre- 
pared to make peace with the advancing army. 
He was now a little way up the river with a party 
of forty or fifty warriors, a body-guard selected 
from his eight hundred men, who were en- 
camped seven miles beyond. As the chief sat 
at supper on the evening of the 14th of May, he 
was told that a small party of white horsemen 
was making camp near by. The creek on whose 
banks the Americans had halted was lined with 
tall willows, which made a good protection for the 
camp. The vanguard of the two brigades had 
stopped, tied their horses to the trees, and begun 
to build fires for supper when three Indians ap- 
peared on a height nearly a mile away. It after- 
wards proved that these Indians were messengers 
from Black Hawk and were bearing a white flag of 
truce. The scouts at sight of the Indians rushed 
out and seized them. Black Hawk and his men, 
watching at a distance, saw their men captured and 
prepared hastily to meet and attack the whites. 
The squads of soldiers who had started in the 
chase were scattered without any regular order 
along half a mile of the valley. When the fore- 



The Black Hawk War 209 

most of the pursuers came upon Black Hawk and 
his men hidden behind a growth of brush, the 
savages dashed out upon them with wild war- 
whoops. The soldiers thought that eight hun- 
dred Indians were behind their leader, and scat- 
tered in every direction. Their officers tried to 
rally them, but the force was disorganized. The 
men leaped on their horses and rode away. The 
Indians, astonished at this sudden development, 
feared that they were being led into an ambush ; 
but they pursued the white men, killing those 
whom they overtook. At one or two places 
companies of soldiers turned and made a gallant 
fight, but most of them escaped on their swift 
horses. By twos and threes they straggled into 
the camp at Dixon's Ferry, twenty-five miles 
away, with a story of defeat that spread a panic 
over the whole frontier. The army marched 
next day to the scene of the surprise ; but Black 
Hawk and his men w'"*-e gone, and it was not 
thought wise to pun »i them farther north with- 
out a better supply of provisions. The unex- 
pected and easy victory had encouraged Black 
Hawk and had brought many Indians of other 
tribes to his side. 

A reign of terror followed Stillman's defeat, 
p 



2IO The Story of the Great Lakes 

Scalping parties organized by Black Hawk cov- 
ered the frontier, making raids on the exposed 
northern settlements. Many on both sides lost 
their lives, for small parties of American settlers 
made gallant defences in their scattered villages 
and held the Indians back. Three weeks from 
the time of the first attack a new army of volun- 
teers, four thousand strong, took the field. They 
marched to Dixon's Ferry and then plunged into 
the wilderness, taking every precaution as they 
proceeded into the enemy's country to guard 
against surprise. On the 30th of June they 
crossed the Illinois border near the present city 
of Beloit, Wisconsin, and came upon abandoned 
camps and other signs of the retreating Indians. 

The progress through the wilderness of Wis- 
consin was slow and difficult. Day after day the 
troops pushed on, wading up to their armpits in 
mud and water, or hewing away the trees and 
underbrush that barred their course. After three 
weeks they came up with the last of the fugitives. 
Passing through a forest where stands to-day the 
city of Madison, they came to the shores of the 
Wisconsin River, and there they fought the bat- 
tle of Wisconsin Heights. The loss of life among 
the Indians was heavy; among the Americans, 



The Black Hawk War 211 

light. During the night after the battle, the 
startled soldiers sitting in their camp heard from 
the direction of the Indian encampment a loud, 
clear voice speaking in an unknown tongue. 
I They feared that some chief was directing his 
men to descend upon the camp and make a night 
attack. After a time, however, the voice ceased 
and nothing more was thought of the incident. 
It proved afterwards that this was the voice of an 
orator sent by Black Hawk to beg for peace. He 
had used the Winnebago tongue, and as the 
members of that tribe had left the camp that very 
day, no one understood him. Thus the second 
attempt of Black Hawk to make peace failed. 

From this time on the story of the campaign 
is a tale of relentless pursuit and slaughter of the 
fugitives. Black Hawk and his starving war- 
party reached the banks of the Mississippi, but 
an American steamer prevented their crossing in 
safety. The troops came upon them at a point 
called Bad Axe, and for three hours the bloody 
conflict raged. The white men lost only seven- 
teen men killed, and twelve wounded. At least 
one hundred and fifty Indians were killed in the 
battle and as many more men, women, and chil- 
dren were drowned or shot down in their attempts 



212 The Story of the Great Lakes 

to escape. Nearly a thousand Indians had crossed 
the Mississippi at Rock River, two hundred miles 
below. Barely one hundred and fifty regained 
the western bank at Bad Axe. 

General Winfield Scott brought home the 
remaining troops, who were attacked by cholera 
on the journey and suffered great losses. The 
Winnebagoes, with whom Black Hawk sought 
refuge, delivered him over to the Americans, who 
put him under the guardianship of his former 
rival, the peace-loving Keokuk. By order of 
the war department the fallen warrior was taken 
during the time of his captivity on a tour of the 
country to see in the east the strength of the 
white man and realize the futility of further resist- 
ance by the Indian. On his first trip he went to 
Washington, was received by President Jackson, 
and was taken to Philadelphia, New York, up the 
Hudson, and back by way of the Great Lakes to 
Rock River, where he was set free. In 1837 
Keokuk, who did not dare leave him unwatched 
in his absence, took him to Washington again 
with a deputation of Sauk and Fox Indians, and 
on this trip he went to Boston. The experiences 
of the savage warrior in this eastern city take us 
back to the time when Champlain took his Indian 



The Black Hawk War 213 

host Darontal to the little settlement at Quebec 
in 1616, and showed him the civilization of the 
Frenchman. Nothing could portray better the 
change in the relations of the white man and the 
red man in the two hundred years that had come 
between. 

The Indian delegation was received by the 
mayor, the aldermen, and the common council of 
Boston at Faneuil Hall. The armories and the 
navy-yard were visited to show the military power 
of Bostonians ; a levee was held at Faneuil Hall 
to receive the ladies who desired to meet the 
warriors; and on Monday morning, October 30, 
1837, they were formally received in the Hall of 
the House of Representatives by Governor 
Everett, attended by his staff and other officers. 
In flowing and graceful language the governor 
welcomed the Indians on behalf of the Common- 
wealth, addressing them in the Indian style of 
oratory. The chiefs responded, one by one, to 
his words. Black Hawk in a shrill, clear voice 
that attracted the attention of the audience to the 
famous veteran warrior. All thanked the gov- 
ernor for his kind words and shook hands with 
him, expressing their desire for friendship with 
the white men. The party then adjourned to the 



214 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Boston Common, where they performed a series 
of war-dances in the presence of an immense 
crowd; and in the evening they went to the 
Tremont Theatre to see " The Banker of 
Bogota," which was being played there. With 
this scene the picture of the Hfe of the last great 
Indian warrior of the lake region ends. Black 
Hawk returned to his home and died the next 
year at the age of seventy-one, in a reservation at 
Des Moines, Iowa, set apart for him and his few 
remaining followers. The Indians had been 
humbled and defeated. 

The Black Hawk War called national attention 
to the western country. The troops had explored 
a wilderness little known to the Americans, and 
the story of their march into Wisconsin had been 
published in full in the newspapers of the East. 
Guide-books were issued, painting in brilliant 
colors the charms of the region, and a tide of 
westward immigration followed the sale of public 
lands by the government. Northern Illinois 
gained a large population, and Wisconsin was 
made a territory within four years. The founda- 
tion of the lake states had been laid; the North- 
west had been Americanized. 



PART III 
OCCUPATION AND DEVELOPMENT 



CHAPTER XVII 

GATEWAYS OF THE GREAT LAKES 

THE Great Lakes are entered from the 
outer world by a series of natural gate- 
ways extending from the mouth of the 
St. Lawrence to the westernmost end of Lake 
Superior. With a shrewd instinct the savages 
selected these spots as the centres for their forest 
trails and as the crossing places over which they 
could carry their boats from river to lake and lake 
to river. At these points the French and Eng- 
lish erected stockades and forts around which 
gathered small settlements. Americans, entering 
at the beginning of the nineteenth century into 
possession of the country, built there the towns 
and cities which to-day command the commerce 
of the Great Lakes. With the founding of these 
cities the period of permanent occupation begins. 
The French approached the Great Lakes from 
Quebec and Montreal. Because of Iroquois hos- 
tility they avoided the southern route by Niagara 

217 



21 8 The Story of the Great Lakes 

and along Lake Erie, and ascended instead the 
Ottawa River, crossed Lake Nipissing, and 
passed through Georgian Bay into Lake Huron. 
At Sault Ste. Marie and Mackinac they built 
their missions and trading posts. Here Mar- 
quette and Joliet heard tales of the great river to 
the south and the rich copper country to the west, 
and from these centres the French explorers started 
on their expeditions into Wisconsin, Illinois, and 
Indiana. Before the English had explored more 
than a narrow strip of seaboard the French were 
travelling up the Fox-Wisconsin rivers to the 
Mississippi, or by way of the Chicago and Illinois 
rivers to the southern country. Returning parties 
often proceeded by way of the Kankakee River 
to the St. Joseph, or by the Wabash and the 
Maumee to Toledo on Lake Erie. 

Frontenac saw the importance of occupying the 
strategic points on the lakes. He himself went 
up the St. Lawrence River and planted on the 
site of Kingston the fort that bore his name. 
He encouraged La Salle to build a trading post 
at Niagara, and did all in his power to gain Lake 
Erie and Lake Ontario for the French. Grad- 
ually the French succeeded in making their way 
eastward. They occupied the strait of Detroit, 



Gateways of the Great Lakes 219 

and built forts at Sandusky, Presque Isle (Erie), 
Niagara, Oswego, and Toronto. The English 
seized these forts and planted many more. 
When the Americans in their turn took posses- 
sion, and Wayne's treaty of Greenville gave, in 
1796, some assurance of safety in the region, they 
sent out not only soldiers but colonists and 
settlers. Their story is the tale of the beginning 
of our modern civilization. 

In the early days of the American Revolution, 
Congress suggested to the states that they should 
cede their claims to lands west of the Allegheny 
to the central government ; but many years 
elapsed before the United States gained from 
the eastern states these cessions. Of all the 
states Connecticut had the best claim ; in making 
its cession it reserved a triangular bit of country 
on the southern shore of Lake Erie, west of 
Pennsylvania, which was known as the Western 
Reserve. Before long a Connecticut land com- 
pany bought three million acres in this tract at 
forty cents an acre, and in the spring of 1796 
Moses Cleveland with fifty associates set out to 
plant on the shores of Lake Erie the colony of 
New Connecticut. They decided to found their 
first settlement at the mouth of the Cuyahoga 



220 The Story of the Great Lakes 

River, which was the terminus of several trails, 
notably that which led to Akron, Ohio, and 
south to Marietta. At this spot, on the 22d 
of July, 1796, they began to build their houses, 
where stands to-day the city of Cleveland, and 
so rapid was the growth of this region that in 
four years' time there were thirty-two settlements 
within the limits of the Connecticut Reserve. 

Massachusetts ceded to the United States her 
claims to lands west of Pennsylvania, but retained 
her right to lands in what is now western New 
York. In 1788 she sold to a company of New 
Yorkers a large part of these lands, including 
the Genesee Valley. At this time there was but 
one white man's cabin between Oswego and Fort 
Niagara. The falls of the Genesee attracted 
settlers, because there they could build mills for 
grinding corn and sawing lumber. Colonel 
Nathaniel Rochester, with three other Maryland 
gentlemen, purchased in 1802 one hundred acres 
at this point, including the site of this mill, and 
laid out a village, opening the sale of lots in 
181 1. He moved to his land in 1818, the little 
village was named after him, and before many 
years became a prosperous town. 

Buffalo was founded by Joseph Ellicott, 



Gateways of the Great Lakes 221 

brother of the first surveyor-general of the 
United States. He laid out the town on the 
plan of Washington city, with broad, radiating 
avenues, and gave to them Dutch names, as Vol- 
lenhoven and Schimmelpennick, calling the vil- 
lage New Amsterdam. When the town was 
incorporated in 18 10, the inhabitants renamed 
it Buffalo, according to the old Indian name for 
the creek which makes into the lake at this point. 
The prosperity of Buffalo and Rochester, and 
of Oswego, which was incorporated as a village 
in 1828, was assured by the building of the Erie 
Canal system in 1825. 

In spite of her hundred years of history De- 
troit began life anew under American rule. In 
1805 the town caught fire, and within four hours 
the old French settlement was gone. Of two 
hundred buildings within the stockade, only one 
was left standing. The newly elected officers 
of Ohio Territory reached Detroit the day after 
the fire to find the town wiped out, and in a 
few years the American Detroit v/as laid out 
and built up on the favorite plan of the city of 
Washington. 

The western lakes had been the first to be ap- 
proached by Frenchmen coming from the north ; 



222 The Story of the Great Lakes 

they were the last to be settled by Americans 
coming from the Atlantic seaboard. But when 
their importance came to be recognized their 
cities sprang up with amazing rapidity. By the 
treaty of Greenville the Indians ceded to the 
white men, along with other territory, " one piece 
of land six miles square at the mouth of the 
Checagau River." This spot had always been a 
centre for Indian tribes and for fur trade. In 
1 82 1 Governor Cass bought from the Indians 
this part of Illinois and the state of Michigan. 
Trade with the Indians attracted a few settlers 
to Chicago during the next few years, and in 
1833 twenty-eight electors met and chose trustees 
to administer public affairs. They established 
a free ferry across the river, reconstructed and 
strengthened the log jail, and built for twelve 
dollars an estray pen for lost animals, and thus 
the town of Chicago began. Four years later it 
became an organized municipahty with a popula- 
tion of four thousand. It was the centre of one 
of the land-booms which collapsed in the panic 
of 1837, ^"^ suffered for many years thereafter 
a succession of disasters. Floods swept the low 
ground on which the town was built, which has 
since been elevated ; cholera, droughts, and 



Gateways of the Great Lakes 223 



financial panics came upon her but were unable 
to conquer. From the great fire of 1871 Chicago 
rose once more to justify the opportunities of her 
location and to become the leading city of the 
Great Lakes. 



GATEWAYS OF THE LAKES 




The Black Hawk War opened up in 1832 the 
southern part of Wisconsin. Land along the 
Milwaukee River was purchased by the Indians, 
and in 1835 the first white owners began their 
homes. In the summer of 1836 there was a rush 
of immigration. Sixty buildings were put up in 
the seven months, and more would have been 
erected if lumber could have been obtained. 
Streets were graded, ferries established, and on 
July 14 the first number of the first newspaper 
of Milwaukee issued a call to ''all good men and 
true" to assemble and petition the governor to 



224 The Story of the Great Lakes 

appoint officers of law for the township. That 
winter seven hundred people stayed in the town, 
and three years later the canal from Rock River 
to Milwaukee made the town an eastern gateway 
for the trade of the new territory of Wisconsin, 
which was at that time notably wealthy in furs. 
In 1846 the town became a city. 

Through the entire struggle for possession of 
the Great Lakes, Mackinac and Sault Ste. Marie 
had kept their positions as trading centres 
and points for military defence. No permanent 
settlement was made west of these posts for many 
years. Nearly two centuries before the city of 
Duluth was founded, Daniel Greyselon Du Luth 
was leader of an expedition organized by French 
merchants of Quebec and Montreal to trade with 
the Indians. In the course of his dealings with 
the tribes he held an important conference at the 
head of the lake, where a trading post was later 
established on land now a part of the city of 
Superior, Wisconsin, opposite the city of Duluth. 
This trading station was owned by the North- 
western Fur Company, and was an important 
meeting-place for white men and Indians. In 
1826, on his second western trip. Governor Lewis 
Cass concluded at this Minnesota outpost a treaty 



Gateways of the Great Lakes 225 

with the Indians, giving to the United States the 
right to explore and carry away any minerals that 
might be found in the country bordering on the 
lake. To gain this important concession the 
commissioners determined to do all they could to 
impress the tribes with the power and majesty of 
the United States' representatives. In barges 
from which the Stars and Stripes were gayly fly- 
ing, and to the tune of "Hail Columbia," played 
by a military band, the treaty-makers sailed into 
the harbor amid the shouts and cheers of the 
Indians on the shore. The treaty was signed, 
and later agreements also made on this spot gave 
to the government the remainder of the country. 
By 1850 there were permanent settlers at the 
head of the lake as well as lumbermen all along 
the St. Croix River. Congress appropriated in 
1854 money to build a road to connect Lake 
Superior by the St. Croix Valley with the Missis- 
sippi River. The settlers at Superior, Wiscon- 
sin, were bitter rivals of those at Duluth. In 
order to be sure to get the road they cut a road 
southward from Superior to meet it and bring 
it out on the Wisconsin side of the St. Louis 
River. In this way Superior got the start of 
Duluth, but the latter was incorporated in 1857, 

Q 



226 The Story of the Great Lakes 

and became before many years a prosperous 
city. 

By the middle of the nineteenth century 
Duluth, the most remote gateway of the Great 
Lakes, had begun its history as a town. In 1825 
Henry Clay, speaking on the bill to grant lands 
for the building of the Soo Canal, had mentioned 
these great waterways as "beyond the furthest 
bounds of civilization, — if not in the moon." 
Six years later Edward Everett enunciated the 
principle of the future, declaring that "intercourse 
between the mighty interior West and the sea- 
coast is the great principle of our commercial 
prosperity." The cities of the Great Lakes — 
Buffalo, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, 
and Duluth — recognized their opportunity to 
become the connecting links in this inevitable 
chain of intercourse. Their sites were strategic, 
but they had much to do to meet the demands of 
the rapidly increasing commerce. Their citizens 
were alert and eager to fulfil these demands. 
Buffalo gained her position as the terminus of the 
Erie Canal because public-spirited citizens gave 
bonds that her harbor should be improved. 
Every city spent large sums in constructing and 
improving her natural facilities. The fresh needs 



Gateways of the Great Lakes 227 

of every new decade have been met, and to-day 
the lake system is on the eve of even greater 
achievements. 

These cities have a background of which they 
may well be proud, — a background of men 
who, in pioneer times of hardship and poverty, 
were men of prescience, of courage, and of action. 
To-day the six cities have a population of nearly 
four million people. United by their common 
bond of harborage on the Great Lakes, but situ- 
ated in six states of the Union, these cities and 
their smaller neighbors are taking a prominent 
part in the nation. Men of vision and of energy 
still walk their streets, planning and guiding their 
present and future. Their sites are being beauti- 
fied and improved; their social and economic 
problems are being solved; and they are keeping 
themselves fit gateways for the prosperous states 
they represent on the great inland seas of North 
America. 



CHAPTER XVIII 



THE STORY OF A ROAD 



AS the Indian read in the signs of the trail 
— the depth of a moccasin print or the 
direction of a broken twig — the story 
of those who had journeyed over the path before 
him, so we can find in the tale of successive kinds 
of roads the record of the advance of the white 
man into the West. For roads the French traders 
used those of the original occupants of the land, — 
the buffalo tracks and the Indian trails. English- 
speaking settlers, coming from the Atlantic sea- 
coast, used two main routes. They came either 
by river and portage up the Ohio and its 
various tributaries to Presque Isle on Lake Erie, 
or from Albany across western New York to 
Niagara. The story of early voyages and of the 
founding and life of Detroit gives a picture of 
French exploration and settlement ; in like man- 
ner there is written in the rapid change of the 
land and water thoroughfares across New York 

228 



The Story of a Road 229 

State, from Indian trail and river course to turn- 
pike, canal, and railroad, the tale of the settlement 
of the lake region, and of the change from a wil- 
derness to a thickly populated country. 

As soon as the explorer landed on the southern 
shores of Lake Erie, Lake Michigan, and Lake 
Superior, he came upon buffalo roads or "traces." 
Sometimes these were narrow ditches, a foot wide 
and from six inches to two feet deep, trodden 
down by the impact of thousands of hoofs as herd 
after herd of buffaloes had stamped along in single 
file behind their leaders. When the first path 
became too deep for comfort because of repeated 
travel, the buffaloes would abandon it and begin 
a second path alongside the first, and thus the 
frequented traces would be gradually widened. 
Again an immense herd of these heavy animals 
would crash through the forest, breaking in their 
rapid progress a broad, deep road from one feed- 
ing-ground to another. As this route would be 
followed again and again by this and other herds, 
it would become level and hard as rock, so that 
there was great rejoicing in pioneer settlements 
when the weary road-makers, struggling with log 
causeways and swampy hollows, came upon a 
firm, solid buffalo trace. Nor was this an un- 



230 The Story of the Great Lakes 

common experience. The line of many of these 
roads is followed to-day by our railroads and 
canals as it was followed in the middle period by 
log roads and turnpikes. The buffalo was a good 
surveyor. He did not reason out why he should 
go in a certain direction, but his sure instinct took 
him by the easiest and most direct paths over 
high lands and low to the salt licks and water- 
courses which were his goal. Indeed, he observed 
precisely the principles which govern to-day the 
civil engineer. He followed the level of the val- 
ley ; he swerved around high points wherever it 
was possible, crossing the ridges and watersheds 
at the best natural divides and gorges; and he 
crossed from one side of a stream of water to the 
other repeatedly in order to avoid climbing up 
from the level, after the fashion of our modern 
loop railways. 

Not so conspicuous, but more numerous, were 
the Indian trails. Where their destination was 
the same the Indians used the buffalo roads, but 
their own paths were quite distinct. These were 
narrow foot-paths, usually from twelve to eighteen 
inches wide, through which the Indians travelled 
single file. Three things were necessary for an 
Indian trail : it must be secluded, hidden if pos- 



The Story of a Road 231 

sible from hostile eyes ; it must be direct ; and it 
must be dry. Over these narrow lanes the trees 
and bushes interlaced so closely that it was impos- 
sible to see more than a rod or two ahead, and a 
neglected path soon became impassable. To 
know which paths could be traversed at each season 
of the year, and where storm, flood, or fire were 
likely to have had the least effect, and to be able 
to follow the forkings and windings of these forest 
routes, was to be skilled in the art of the woods- 
man and to be valuable as a guide. 

Like the buffalo traces the Indian paths were 
often worn deep, almost always six inches and 
sometimes a foot. So well-travelled was the 
Indian trail of our story, the Iroquois trail across 
New York, that it was called by the Jesuit fathers 
" The Beaten Road." That buffalo came as far 
east as the present city of Buffalo, New York, is 
beyond question. Whether they penetrated 
farther into the interior of the state is not known, 
but in every other respect this region had each 
kind of road in turn. It is not only one of the 
main thoroughfares of travel, but is also a typical 
scene of pioneer adventure and achievement. 

The main Iroquois trail led from Albany, the 
eastern door of the " Long House,'* to Niagara, the 



232 The Story of the Great Lakes 



western door. It followed the natural geographi- 
cal route along the Mohawk Valley to Schenec- 
tady, Utica, and Rome, where stood the great 
Mohawk "castles," and turned from this point 
south to Onondaga (Syracuse), the centre of the 
confederacy, and westward by the heads of Lake 
Seneca and Canandaigua to Lewiston and Niagara. 




Trail 



Albanyl 



— — — - Tumpikt 



It is unusual among Indian trails because it was 
notably a peace-path. The Six Nations rarely 
quarrelled among themselves, but kept up an 
interchange of goods and gossip that was remark- 
able among savages. Runners were trained to 
carry summonses to councils and to spread the 
news. It was said that it took only three days 
and three runners to send a message from one 
door of the " Long House " to the other, from 
Albany to Niagara, a distance of three hundred 
miles, each Indian being expected to make in a 
day his " century run." 



The Story of a Road 233 

Along the Hne of this trail the American 
pioneer built, in the twenty years from 1785 to 
181 5, his log roads and turnpikes. They were 
crude, rough affairs, "very grievous to the limbs," 
and called forth the maledictions of the travellers 
who ventured off the usual routes into the out- 
skirts of civilization. As the district grew more 
populous the roads came gradually under state 
control. Commissioners and improvement com- 
panies connected and made better the separate 
stretches of highway. In 1794 the legislature 
passed a law, directing the state road to be ex- 
tended from Fort Schuyler (Utica) to the Gen- 
esee River, and four years later it was voted to 
extend it " westward to the extremity of the 
state." This western end of the road, from the 
Mohawk River to Lake Erie, was, as it happened, 
incorporated by the state under the name of "The 
Genesee Turnpike" in 1800 before that from 
Albany to the Mohawk was given formal recog- 
nition. We have thus the unusual spectacle of a 
road established in the remote sections of the 
country before the connecting road to the nearest 
city is completed. To raise money for its con- 
struction all kinds of methods had been used, 
from government appropriations to lotteries. 



234 The Story of the Great Lakes 

The method of road-building in the pioneer 
settlements was one that developed throughout 
the colonies, as here in New York, into the 
establishment of turnpike roads. At first the 
local governments, the townships, or counties, 
built the roads. As these became inadequate, 
corporations of individuals were given permission 
to build roads and charge tolls for their use. 
The name of turnpike was given to these private 
highways because at the place where toll was to 
be collected there was placed a gate hung in such 
a way as to turn on a post. This gate was made 
of a long pole and could be swung across the 
road to stop carriages, animals, and people till 
the toll fees had been collected. When a cor- 
poration was given a charter, the legislature pre- 
scribed the number of toll-gates to be set up on 
the given length of road, and gave the usual form 
for tolls. The directors were left to fill in the 
fees in each case. This accepted table of tolls 
shows the kind of vehicles in use in New York 
at this time. A one-horse two-wheeled carriage 
was called a sulky, chair, or chaise. A chariot, 
coach, coachee, or phaeton might be drawn by 
one horse, but was more commonly specified to 
have two. Stage-wagons, stages, and other four- 



The Story of a Road 235 

wheeled carriages drawn by two horses had their 
separate fee. Just as our highway commissioners 
of to-day encourage wide tires because they put 
less wear on the road, so in these days there was a 
rule that carriages with tires twelve inches wide 
should pay no tolls, nine-inch tires should ex- 
empt the vehicle from three-quarters of the tolls, 
and six-inch from one-half. It was required that 
the table of tolls be posted in a conspicuous 
place over the gate. 

In March, 18 13, Nathaniel Rochester and 
other gentlemen were given permission to form 
a turnpike company for a road from Canandaigua 
to the falls of the Genesee River. As this was 
not a thickly settled region the table of tolls is a 
simple one without elaborate specifications as to 
the kinds of carriages and with only two toll- 
gates, but as part of our historic road it is of 
special interest. 

Table of Tolls of Rochester Turnpike Companyy 

March Ji, 181J 

Cents 
For every cart, wagon, or other wheeled carriage, drawn 

by 2 horses, mules, or oxen 12-I 

And for each additional horse, mule, or ox ... . 6 
For every cart, wagon, or other two-wheeled carriage 

drawn by i horse or mule 9 



236 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Cents 

For every horse rode, led, or driven 6 

For every four-wheeled pleasure carriage or w^agon 

drawn by 2 horses 25 

And for each additional horse 6 

For every sleigh or sled drawn by i horse, mule, or ox 6 

And for every additional horse, mule, or ox ... . 6 

For every score of horses, mules, or cattle .... 20 
And in like proportion for a greater or less number 

For every score of sheep or hogs 8 

And in like proportion for a greater or less number 

In the next chapter the experiences of two 
travellers are given, the first in 1796, the second 
in 181 1. The two accounts of their journeys 
show the wonderful transformation wrought along 
the line of this highway in fifteen years. By the 
end of the first decade of the nineteenth century 
New York State had one hundred and thirty-one 
turnpikes, and our second traveller was constantly 
hearing discussion of a new project to which the 
enterprising leaders of the state were turning 
their attention. For purposes of trade the new 
land route had never supplanted the old water- 
ways. With the rapid occupation of the region 
of the Great Lakes this trade was increasing at a 
surprising rate, and much of it was being di- 
verted to the English merchants of the St. Law- 



The Story of a Road 237 

rence River, because of the greater facility of the 
route to Montreal over that to New York. It 
cost only a dollar and a half to send a barrel of 
flour from Cayuga in western New York to 
Montreal, while it took at least two dollars and a 
half to get the same barrel from Cayuga only as 
far as Albany. If this were true of western New 
York, it was even more true of the southern 
shores of the Great Lakes. 

Only an artificial canal could overcome the 
natural obstacles to water transportation, and this 
the leading men of New York were urging with 
all their power. Since 1792 the Western Inland 
Lock Navigation Company had been seeking 
systematically to improve the existing water route 
by building canals around the worst obstructions 
to navigation, the various falls and rapids of the 
Mohawk River. From the success of these small 
ventures and the no less convincing evidence of 
the abiHty of the canal to solve the whole prob- 
lem, came in the minds of Gouverneur Morris, 
Jesse Hawley, and others the plan to connect the 
Atlantic with the lakes by an artificial waterway. 
To Governor De Witt CHnton and his associates 
belongs the credit of working out this stupendous 
undertaking. The story of its progress and 



238 The Story of the Great Lakes 

achievement is too long a tale to be summarized 
here, but must be reserved for another chapter. 
In 1825 the Erie Canal of three hundred and 
sixty-three miles was completed and opened with 
appropriate ceremonies. 

The turnpike had followed the line of the old 
Iroquois trail. The canal had followed it in cer- 
tain sections but had swerved off and gone north- 
ward along a minor Indian trail which passed 
over a natural highway formed by a wide ridge 
from four to six miles inland from the shores of 
Lake Ontario. This was what was called by the 
pioneers the Ridge Road from Lewiston to 
Rochester. One more kind of road was destined 
to cross the state, supplanting the lumbering 
stage-wagon and the slow canal-boat for the pur- 
poses of travel, and even as time went on for the 
carrying of freight. The first piece of railroad 
to be built in New York State, and one of the 
oldest in the United States, was the Mohawk and 
Hudson. It was chartered in 1826, the year 
after the completion of the Erie Canal, and work 
was begun upon it in 1830. Seventeen miles of 
this road, connecting Albany and Schenectady, 
were opened in 1 83 1 ; the remaining part from 
Schenectady to Utica five years later. Horses 



The Story of a Road 239 

were used when the road was put into operation, 
so that it was in reality little more than a tram- 
way, but locomotives were soon substituted. 
The third engine built in the United States was 
sent from the West Point Foundry Works to 
this little piece of road. It was called the De 
Witt Clinton, and was built in 183 1. It weighed 
three and a half tons where now two hundred tons 
is not considered especially heavy for an engine, 
and was fed by anthracite coal. Mr. William H. 
Brown, who was one of the passengers on the 
first trip, was so impressed by the appearance 
of this " singular-looking affair and its equally 
singular-looking appendages," that he sketched 
on the back of a letter a drawing of the engine 
and the passenger-cars, with correct likenesses, 
which he afterwards enlarged to a picture six feet 
long which was cut out of black paper in silhou- 
ette fashion and is in possession of the Connecti- 
cut Historical Society. Reproductions of this 
picture give a good idea of the first locomotive 
and train of passenger-cars ever run in the state 
of New York. The cars are those which had 
been used for a year with horses on this same 
route. 

A great crowd assembled on August 9, 1831, 



240 The Story of the Great Lakes 

to see the train start. The fortunate guests of 
the road cHmbed into their seats, the engineer 
took his place on the tender, a tin horn was 
sounded, and the train with its five passenger- 
coaches started off. The outside passengers had 
no awning or roof to protect them, and as the 
sparks and smoke were blown back they began 
to fear for their combustible straw hats and 
summer garments ; but no accident happened. 
The passengers had hardly had time to adjust 
their high beavers and settle themselves after the 
shock of starting, which had been with such a 
jerk that they had been knocked into each other 
and against the low roof, when the train stopped 
abruptly at the first water station on the road. 
Here a halt was made and an experiment tried 
to avoid these unpleasant jerks. The links in 
the couplings of the cars were stretched to their 
utmost length, and rails, borrowed unceremoni- 
ously from a neighboring fence, were bound to 
these couplings, one between each pair of cars, 
to hold the coaches steady. This arrangement 
worked well, and in a short time the train pulled 
into Schenectady, where thousands of people were 
lined up to await its coming. 

As in the case of the canal and the turnpike, 



The Story of a Road 241 

small sections of the railroad were built first, and 
finally joined into one long highway. Eight 
short lines were built in New York along the 
line of the road to Lake Erie and were put in 
operation at different times. These lines were 
owned in 1842 by eleven companies. The ten- 
dency to consolidation reduced the number to 
seven by 1850, and then the great era of concen- 
tration brought them all under the New York 
Central management. 

From the leaf-strewn path for the moccasined 
Indian the road of our story has become a part 
of a system of seventy thousand miles of high- 
way which replace the turnpikes in connecting 
the towns of New York State. Its turbulent 
streams have become the feeders for a great 
artificial waterway, and an iron-railed road-bed 
stretches along its route, over which flies a lim- 
ited train at the rate of seventy miles an hour. 
The lumbering stage-wagon has given way to the 
smooth-running drawing-room car. The rivers 
and swamps are spanned by fine bridges. The 
story of the road has been one of swift change 
and rapid advance. 



CHAPTER XIX 

BEFORE AND AFTER THE TURNPIKE 

BEFORE the nineteenth century, travellers 
who visited Niagara generally went there 
by way of Montreal and Lake Ontario, 
returning to the seacoast by Presque Isle (Erie, 
Pennsylvania) and Pittsburg to Philadelphia or 
Baltimore. Occasionally an adventurous tourist 
struck out from Albany into the " Back Woods." 
Such an one was Lieutenant John Harriott, an 
Englishman, who visited whatever parts of the 
known world he could reach and recorded his 
journeyings in a book with the suggestive title, — 
" Struggles Through Life, Exemplified in the 
Various Travels and Adventures in Europe, 
Asia, Africa, and America." In June, 1796, he 
set out from New York on a " tour to view the 
back lands." He chose the land route to Albany, 
going the one hundred and sixty miles in a 
" coachee " drawn by two horses. Albany he 
describes as a town of " upwards of six thousand 

242 



Before and after the Turnpike 243 

inhabitants, collected from various parts. . . . 
It is the storehouse for the trade to and from 
Canada and the lakes, therefore likely to flourish 
and the inhabitants to grow rich." The next 
morning he set off at half-past five and travelled 
forty miles by stage through the fertile country 
of the German Flats, every now and then being 
obliged to alight and walk for a mile or two as 
the wagon floundered through a bit of swampy 
road, or up a steep grade. 

Across wet places were bits of log causeways. 
These were made of trunks of pine and oak trees 
laid down crossways layer upon layer, regardless 
of uniformity of size or the comfort of those who 
might travel over them. This kind of road was 
called corduroy because it resembled the French 
cloth of that name. In drier places, the settlers 
cut down trees on the line of the road. Six or 
eight oxen yoked to a plough would stir up the 
soil as deeply as possible, pulling out or displacing 
stumps or rocks. The cleared surface would then 
be smoothed over a little and left to be worn 
hard by travel. 

The " coachee '* or stage-wagon, in which Har- 
riott travelled over this route, was typical of the 
region and was not supplanted on this road 



244 The Story of the Great Lakes 

twenty years later, although by that time more 
modern ones had been put on the line between 
New York and Boston, and New York and Phila- 
delphia. The body of the coachee was rather 
long in proportion to its breadth. It had four 
seats, each holding three passengers, who faced 
towards the horses. " From the height of the 
seat," writes a traveller of the time, " it is open 
all round, and the roof is supported by slender 
shafts rising up at the corners and sides ; in wet 
weather a leathern apron is let down at the sides 
and back, to protect the inmates." The wagon 
had no door ; the passengers got in by the front, 
stepping over the seats as they went backward. 
It was said that these coaches had no outside seats 
on top, as did those in England, because the ve- 
hicle lurched and jolted so violently that pas- 
sengers sitting on them would have been thrown 
off. The heavier boxes and trunks were fastened 
behind, upon the frame of the carriage, but smaller 
articles and the mail-bag were huddled under the 
seats, to the great annoyance of the passengers, who 
were frequently forced " to sit with their knees 
up to their mouths or with their feet insinuated 
between two trunks, where they are most lovingly 
compressed whenever the vehicle makes a lurch 



Before and after the Turnpike 245 

into a rut." The body of the wagon was sus- 
pended upon two stout leathern straps passing 
lengthwise under it and strongly secured before 
and behind. When these straps gave way, as 
they sometimes did, the driver selected a stout 
rail from a neighboring fence. The passengers 
by united effort thrust in this substitute for a 
spring and the conveyance jolted on. 

At the end of his first day's journey, Harriott 
found that the coach in which he was going to 
proceed had been overturned and broken to 
pieces, so that he was obliged to stop three days 
at German Flats Town. As he continued on 
his way to Fort Schuyler (Utica) he found him- 
self in a rich country with many new settlers, but 
as the road steadily became worse and worse, 
although, as he says, he and his fellow-travellers 
" alighted safe from broken bones, [they were] 
most miserably bruised from head to foot." At 
Whitestown, he stayed several days watching 
with interest the allotment of land to settlers 
and visiting the remnant of the Six Nations, 
some sixteen hundred in number, all that were 
left of that fierce confederacy that so long had 
held this region against the white men. 

From this point there was no public convey- 



246 The Story of the Great Lakes 

ance, and Lieutenant Harriott bought a horse 
and proceeded in company with a young farmer 
from Massachusetts who was making his third 
trip westward to conclude a purchase of land on 
the Genesee River and could therefore serve as 
a guide. It took the travellers three days to 
reach Geneva, from which place they journeyed 
fifty miles to the river and thence to Niagara 
Falls, seventy miles more through the wilderness 
following the Indian trails. By making haste, 
they avoided spending more than one night in 
the woods. As darkness fell, they made a bed 
of boughs and kept two fires burning " as a guard 
against wolves and panthers.'' Again gaining 
the Mohawk, he went down-stream in a bateau, 
managed by five men, which he hired for the trip. 
On his return, Harriott wrote that " except for 
a view of the grand falls," there was nothing 
to reward him for the fatigue of the journey. 
Fifteen years after Harriott's visit, John 
Melish, the map-maker, passed over the same 
route. He had come from Cleveland, Ohio, and 
Erie, Pennsylvania, to the Niagara River and the 
town of Buffalo, which had been laid out about 
five years previously, but already had five hun- 
dred inhabitants and was rapidly growing. The 



Before and after the Turnpike 247 

buildings were mostly of wood, painted white, 
but there were a number of good brick houses 
and a few of stone. There were four taverns, 
eight stores, two schools, and a weekly paper in 
this town, which Melish prophesied would be- 
come a great settlement. Already roads were 
being constructed in all directions, and the 
Albany turnpike had been brought to within a 
few miles of the village. As he travelled along, 
he was surprised to find the country so well 
settled. The houses were so frequent that the 
traveller was seldom out of sight of one, and 
every few miles there was an inn. Lands were 
all taken up for a mile or so on either side of the 
road. He constantly met parties journeying 
westward and from inquiry found that a family 
of seven could travel in their own wagon at the 
rate of twenty miles a day, making the journey 
of six hundred miles from Connecticut to Cleve- 
land at an expense of seventy dollars. The 
emigrants would carry their own provisions but 
would stop at the inns to feed their horses and 
eat their food. In the course of one day's jour- 
ney, he met more than twenty families thus pro- 
ceeding westward. 

Stage fares would have made the trip much 



248 The Story of the Great Lakes 

more expensive. By law these fares could not 
exceed seven cents a mile, and no fees to drivers 
were expected. Stage travel was at this time 
made inconvenient by the number of companies 
operating only on short sections of the road. 
Each proprietor took up payment for his own 
portion of the way, — half a dollar here, seventy- 
five cents there, — and turned the traveller out 
of his vehicle when he came to the end of his 
stretch to wait with what patience he could 
summon till the next stage appeared. 

As Melish neared Utica, the houses along the 
road were so thick that it was for a considerable 
way like a continuous village. Yet here as 
everywhere on the route, back of the neat white 
houses with their green blinds and roomy verandas, 
and the fertile, cultivated plots of ground around 
them, the land would be covered with stumps 
from one to three feet high, and the smoke of 
the clearing fires could often be seen in the dis- 
tance. The expense of the trip from Buffalo to 
Utica had been ten dollars and ninety-one cents. 

Melish had made his journey on horseback, 
although he met many coaches on the way. 
In 1 8 19 an Englishwoman describes a trip which 
she made from Albany to Utica in one of the 



Before and after the Turnpike 249 

fifteen coaches that made the trip daily. On her 
way she met the man who eighteen, years previ- 
ously had carried in his coat pocket the weekly 
mail between the two towns. She found the 
journey rough, but her companions good-hu- 
mored, intelligent, and accommodating. She rec- 
ommended the stage-coach for the traveller who 
wished "to see people as well as things, — to 
hear intelligent remarks upon the country and its 
inhabitants, and to understand the rapid changes 
that each year brings forth, and if he be of an easy 
temper, not incommoded with trifles, not caring 
to take, nor understanding to give, offence, liking 
the interchange of httle civilities with strangers, 
and pleased to make an acquaintance, though it 
should be but one of an hour, with a kind-hearted 
fellow-creature, and if too he can bear a few jolts, 
— not a few, — and can suffer to be driven some- 
times too quickly over a rough road, and some- 
times too slowly over a smooth one, — then let 
him, by all means, fill a corner in the post-coach 
or stage-wagon. . . . But if he be of an unsocia- 
ble humour, easily put out of his way, or as the 
phrase is, a very particular gentleman — then he 
will hire or purchase his own dearborn or light 
wagon and travel solus cum solo with his own horse." 
s 



250 The Story of the Great Lakes 

This was turnpike travel in the early nineteenth 
century, and this was the route over which thou- 
sands of families made their way to the lakes. 
For years the tide of emigration went on until 
the story of western New York was repeated in 
every part of the region, and the wilderness of 
twenty and thirty years before became the seat of 
thriving towns and cities. 



CHAPTER XX 



THE ERIE CANAL 



SINCE the beginning of the century there 
had been more or less talk of a canal to 
connect the Hudson with Lake Erie, and 
in 1816 the legislature of New York voted to un- 
dertake the building of the Erie Canal. The 
adoption of this plan and its success were due 
mainly to De Witt Clinton, who set forth in a 
carefully reasoned memorial the advantages of 
the proposed waterway. For years thousands 
of men had been employed in the work, and 
many difficulties had been met and solved. 
Commissioners had been appointed to determine 
the route which the canal should follow and to 
oversee its construction. They conducted opera- 
tions in three sections, intrusting the job of dig- 
ging and filling to contractors, no contract covering 
any large amount of territory. 

The eastern section extended along the line of 
the Iroquois trail up the Mohawk Valley from 

251 



252 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Albany to Rome. On this part of the route 
swift streams had to be crossed, and falls and 
rapids had to be passed. Where the canal crossed 
creeks and streams, guard locks were built to keep 
the water from rushing into the canal and over- 
flowing it. At Little Falls there was such a 
narrow space between the mountains that rocks 
had to be blasted to make a bed for the canal, and 
a wall twenty or thirty feet high, rising from the 
channel of the Mohawk River, built to support 
it. Other falls on this section required aque- 
ducts and elaborate series of locks. 

The middle section followed the line of trail 
and turnpike as far as Syracuse, and then went 
northwards to Clyde and Montezuma. It had 
the greater part of the " Long Level," a sixty- 
nine-mile stretch from a point east of Utica to 
Syracuse, without any locks. At Montezuma, 
near the beginning of the third section, the 
builders came to the edge of the Cayuga marshes, 
and here they erected an embankment, nearly' two 
miles long and so high that boats were often sev- 
enty-two feet above the level of the swamps. At 
Rochester a great aqueduct was built at the 
Genesee River. Between Rochester and Buffalo 
the canal ran for a long distance inside the great 



The Erie Canal 



253 



ridge which rises south of Lake Ontario, but at 
Lockport it crossed the mountains. Here was 
performed one of the most difficult engineering 
feats of the whole construction. An excavation 
was made through the three-mile ridge at an 
average depth of twenty feet, and five great 
locks were built, each twelve feet high, so that 
vessels were elevated and dropped sixty feet. 

The first surveyors drove along the route of 
the canal five lines of stakes. The two outer 
rows were sixty feet apart, indicating the space 
to be cleared. Between these were two other 
rows forty feet apart, which indicated the exact 
width of the canal, and in the middle a single 
line of stakes marked the centre of the waterway. 
It was eight years and four months since the 
surveyors had driven these stakes, amid the 
mocking laughter of the inhabitants, who thought 
these dreamers crazy to plant their bits of wood 
in swamps and forests, on rocky ledges and in 
watercourses. In spite of swamp fever, which 
had at one time laid low a thousand men, and in 
spite of rough tools and almost insuperable ob- 
stacles, the three hundred and sixty-three miles 
were at length completed. By eighty-three locks 
and eighteen aqueducts, covering a descent of 



254 The Story of the Great Lakes 

568 feet from Lake Erie to the Hudson, navi- 
gation was made open. Sections of the canal had 
been in use since 18 19, and now, on October 26, 
1825, Governor Clinton had started on the first 
trip along the entire length of the waterway which 
had long been familiarly known as "Clinton's Big 
Ditch." 

The city of Buffalo was particularly rejoiced 
over this occasion because the western terminus 
of the canal had long been in doubt and had 
only very recently been settled in favor of that 
town over her rival, the present suburb of Black 
Rock. Buffalo was located on the shore of 
Lake Erie at the mouth of the Niagara River. 
Black Rock was three miles down the river, and 
had a good open harbor, in which its citizens had 
recently built a two-mile pier to protect vessels 
from the waves of the lake and river. Buffalo 
Creek had a troublesome sand-bar which injured 
its harbor, and the Black Rock settlers had built 
their pier in the hope of stopping the canal at 
their town instead of having it run on to Buffalo. 
When the canal commissioners came to decide on 
the terminus, they were of the opinion that the 
current of the river was too swift at Black Rock, 
and that the danger from ice and sunken rocks 



The Erie Canal 



^5S 



was too great. They would bring the canal to 
Buffalo if that harbor could be improved. When 
the public-spirited men of that place heard that, 
they agreed together that if the canal was brought 
to their town, they would remove the sand-bar. 
They clubbed together and on their own personal 
notes borrowed from the state twelve thousand 
dollars, a large sum in those days, with which 
they removed the sand-bar and made a safe 
harbor. 

A new canal-boat, the Seneca Chiefs had been 
built of Lake Erie cedar for the opening trip, 
and lay moored in the harbor at Buffalo. On 
her deck were two paintings, one of the scene 
which was soon to be enacted, Buffalo creek and 
harbor with the canal-boat moving away along 
the canal, and the other representing Governor 
Clinton as Hercules, dressed in Roman costume, 
and resting from his labors. At nine o'clock in 
the morning a grand procession formed in front 
of the court-house and marched to the head of 
the canal. Governor Clinton and his staff, and 
a group of prominent New Yorkers who had 
been closely connected with the furtherance of 
the project, went on board the Seneca Chief and 
an address was given. Upon the boat had 



256 The Story of the Great Lakes 

been placed two new kegs containing Lake Erie 
water, which was to be mingled at New York with 
that of the ocean. The Seneca Chief was to be 
followed by four other canal-boats, and a fifth 
craft, which was called Noah's Ark. The last 
contained, under the title " Products of the 
West," a bear, two eagles, two fawns, several fish, 
and two Indian boys, — the counterparts of the 
" beasts, birds, and creeping things " of the Bible 
story. 

As four magnificent gray horses pulled at the 
tow-rope of the Seneca Chiefs and the vessel be- 
gan to move, a signal-gun was discharged, and 
all along the route the cannon that had been 
stationed took up the sound and passed it on till 
the news of the opening was carried to New 
York in one hour and thirty minutes. New 
York responded, sending the message back to 
Buffalo in the same time. 

At almost every town and village along the 
route the Seneca Chief was met with exercises, 
dinners, triumphal arches, and illuminations. So 
steadily was the party welcomed and feted that it 
took them six days to make the journey to 
Albany. Two or three of the celebrations are of 
especial interest. At Lockport the boat was 



The Erie Canal 257 

greeted by a salute of guns which had been cap- 
tured by Perry at the battle of Lake Erie, being 
discharged by a gunner who was said to have 
fought under Napoleon. At Rochester a dra- 
matic ceremony had been arranged. Rain was 
falling when the guests arrived, but this did not 
dampen the inhabitants' zeal. They assembled 
in large numbers along the banks of the canal, 
headed by eight companies of uniformed soldiers. 
As the boat approached the great nine-arch stone 
aqueduct over the Genesee River, the Toung 
Lion of the West^ stationed there " to protect 
the entrance," pushed out from the shore and a 
voice hailed the Seneca Chief, 

" Who comes there ? " cried the Toung Lion s 
spokesman. 

" Your brothers from the West, on the waters 
of the Great Lakes." 

" By what means have they been diverted so 
far from their natural course ? " 

" By the channel of the Grand Erie Canal." 

" By whose authority, and by whom, was a 
work of such magnitude accomplished? " 

" By the authority and by the enterprise of 
patriotic people of the state of New York." 

At this answer the Toung Lion gave way, 



258 The Story of the Great Lakes 

guns were fired, and amid the cheers of the great 
crowd the flotilla of boats, with Governor Clin- 
ton, Lieutenant-Governor Talmadge, and other 
distinguished men on deck, floated into the spa- 
cious basin at the end of the aqueduct. The 
customary procession and address of welcome 
were followed by a grand ball and illumination, 
and the flotilla, increased by the Young Lion of 
the West with several Rochester gentlemen on 
board, proceeded. 

At Rome, on the 30th of October, the first 
sign of unfriendliness was encountered. The in- 
habitants of that place were dissatisfied because 
the canal did not follow the line of the old water- 
way laid out by the Western Inland Locks Navi- 
gation Company, upon which the village of Rome 
had been built. On the day when the group of 
boats left Buffalo, the citizens of Rome had held 
a solemn mourning assembly, and had marched 
with muffled drums from the old canal to the 
new, bearing with them a barrel of water from the 
old which they emptied into the new. Even 
this mournful occasion had been closed with an 
appropriate celebration and feast at the hotel, but 
no warm welcome greeted the travellers on the 
thirtieth. At Schenectady rain and a spirit of 



The Erie Canal 259 

marked opposition met them because it was be- 
lieved that the Erie Canal would be the ruin of 
the town. Hitherto it had been the terminus of 
the Mohawk River route and of the western 
stage and wagon lines. The opening of a direct 
water route to Albany would be fatal to all these 
interests. Only the students of Union College 
broke through the general disapproval, and did 
the honors of the town in the pouring rain. 
That afternoon, November 2, the boats entered 
the last lock at Albany, and were greeted by a 
welcoming salute of twenty-four cannon, fol- 
lowed by appropriate ceremonies. 

From Albany the canal-boats were towed down 
the Hudson by steamer to New York, where 
great celebrations had been prepared. " Never 
before,'* writes an enthusiastic onlooker, "was 
there such a fleet collected and so superbly 
decorated ; and it is very possible that a display 
so grand, so beautiful, and we may even add, 
sublime, will never again be witnessed." 

Governor Clinton poured the Lake Erie water 
into the ocean, another gentleman poured in 
water from several other places, and the waters of 
the Atlantic and the Great Lakes were pro- 
nounced "wedded," joined in indissoluble union. 



26o The Story of the Great Lakes 

A procession a mile and a half long, the greatest 
ever formed in America at that date, marched 
through the streets, a grand exhibition of fire- 
works was held, and a ball was given in a room 
made by the joining of an amphitheatre and a 
circus building, forming the largest ball-room ever 
used in America. All about the hall the great 
names of the canal constructors were blazoned, 
and in the ladies' banquet room a boat made of 
maple sugar, which had been presented to Gov- 
ernor Clinton at Utica, floated in a vessel filled 
with Lake Erie water. At the end of the 'cele- 
bration the committee from the West departed 
for home, bearing a keg of Atlantic water, orna- 
mented with the arms of the city of New York 
and the following words in letters of gold : " Nep- 
tune's return to Pan. New York, 4th Nov. 1825. 
Water of the Atlantic." When the committee 
reached Buffalo with this gift, they held the 
closing scene of the great pageant, mingling the 
waters of the Atlantic with those of Lake Erie. 

If words, festivities, symbolic ceremonies, and 
a waterway of commerce could do it, the Great 
Lakes and the Atlantic were united. The im- 
portance of the outcome justified the hopes of 
the canal-promoters. The canal cost nearly 



The Erie Canal 261 

eleven million dollars ; but the last debts were 
discharged in 1836. Commerce increased greatly 
and was immensely benefited, and within twelve 
years plans were on foot for enlarging the canal, 
which were soon carried out. 

Travellers soon found great pleasure in making 
their western journeys by canal-boat, and the 
canal became a thoroughfare of travel as well as 
of trade. That bright and interesting raconteur, 
Mrs. Anne Royall, went west by this route in 
1 827-1 828, and left a vivid account of the boats 
and their method of locomotion. The canal she 
describes as having a neat railing outside the tow- 
path, painted white and about four feet high. 
Within this railing the route was fringed on both 
sides with beautiful crimson Canadian thistles, 
which flourished in the sandy gravel. Two 
kinds of boats passed along this waterway, — 
packet boats and freight boats. The packet 
boats, accommodating about thirty passengers, 
were fitted up with dining-rooms, separate quar- 
ters for ladies and gentlemen, and rooms lined 
with berths, as was the custom in all steamboats 
of that day. The fare, including board, was 
four cents a mile ; without board, three cents. 
The prices were thirty-seven and a half cents for 



262 The Story of the Great Lakes 

dinner, twenty-five for breakfast, and twelve and 
a half for lodging. Mrs. Roy all made her first 
journey from Schenectady to Utica, a distance of 
eighty miles, passing through twenty-six locks, 
in twenty-four hours. The boat was drawn by 
three stout horses, who proceeded at a brisk trot 
and were relieved' every ten miles by fresh horses 
and a new driver. Freight boats were drawn by 
two horses or even only one, and took passengers 
at the same rate as freight, a cent and a half a 
mile. 

Whenever her boat met another, and this was 
very often, Mrs. Royall sat in dread of a collision, 
or at least a tangling of the ropes, but each time 
they slipped past each other as if by magic. After 
some watching she saw that the boats going west 
had the right of way and proceeded as usual, while 
the boatman of the vessel going east checked his 
horses till the rope fell for an instant very loose 
in the water, and the other boat and team could 
slip over it. The canal was frequently crossed by 
bridges, which made sitting on the upper deck 
dangerous ; but when they approached one of 
these obstructions the helmsman called out in a 
loud voice, " Low bridge ! " and the passengers 
promptly " ducked " their heads. When the tow- 



• The Erie Canal 263 

path crossed the bridge instead of going under it, 
the driver swung his team over so fast that the 
movement of the boat was barely slackened. 
These boats carried the mails, were widely adver- 
tised for traffic and travel, and were met at every 
important point by stages connecting with the 
neighboring towns and villages. This method of 
travelling was recommended by all as far preferable 
to the jolting, overcrowded stage-coach. 

Until 1858 the Erie Canal was the all-important 
transportation route between the Great Lakes and 
the Atlantic. Even the coming of the railroad 
did not take away its trade, and as late as 1862 
the ton-mileage of canal traffic was more than 
double the combined ton-mileage of the New 
York Central and the Erie railroads. Twenty 
years later canal tolls were abolished and the canal 
became a free waterway, maintained and operated 
by the state. Since the 1862 enlargement there 
has been no permanent improvement of any im- 
portance of the canal until the present day. With 
the increase of railroad traffic and the hampering 
effect of the conditions of forty years ago, — even 
the same style of boats, and horse towage, — the 
canal has not been able to keep pace with the 
railroad, and its traffic has gradually fallen off, 



264 The Story of the Great Lakes 

until it is to-day only two-thirds that of 1868 and 
less than one-tenth the freight tonnage on either 
the New York Central or Erie roads. 

A committee appointed in 1899 investigated 
the condition of the canal and advised enlargement 
of its bed. Their recommendations were ap- 
proved by popular vote in 1903, and the enlarge- 
ment is now in progress. The new canal is to be 
navigable by steam-towed barges drawing ten feet 
of water and having a carrying capacity of at least 
a thousand tons, which is four times that of the 
largest boat in use on the existing canal. The 
route is also to be considerably changed. River 
and lake channels are to be utilized in one-half 
the new part of the route, carrying the canal north- 
ward along the line of the Seneca River and Oneida 
Lake to the Mohawk, and away from Syracuse 
and Rochester. It is interesting to note that in 
making use of river and water beds the canal 
returns more nearly to the route of the old Indian 
trail. Improved methods of engineering will do 
away with several locks. At Waterford on the 
Hudson five locks will take the place of the six- 
teen now necessary at Cohoes ; at Lockport two 
locks are to be substituted for five. The minimum 
depth of the channel is to be twelve feet, and the 



The Erie Canal 265 

locks are to be at least three hundred and twenty- 
eight feet long. With all these changes it is esti- 
mated that the crip from Buffalo to New York 
will be cut down from ten days to five, and that 
a large amount of traffic will turn to the canal as 
the cheapest and most satisfactory method of 
transportation. 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE GREAT LAKES IN 1 84O 

THE decade from 1830 to 1840 witnessed 
a rush of people to the country of the 
Great Lakes. As pioneers had poured 
into New York State twenty years before and 
changed the wilderness into a settled country, so 
they came now by hundreds and thousands into 
Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin, 
clearing away the forests and building villages, 
towns, and cities with amazing rapidity. The 
common phrase of gazetteers of that day about 
cities like Toledo, Michigan City, Chicago, and 
Milwaukee is that in 1 830-1 834 this place was 
"dense forest," or "contained a solitary family,'' 
or "was scarcely known," but now in 1840 it has 
from two to three or four thousand inhabitants, 
as the case may be ; and the tale might be re- 
peated in a lesser way for all the villages and 
towns of the region. 

In a few years Buffalo and Cleveland changed 

266 



The Great Lakes in 1840 267 

from " remote settlements " to the well-built, 
luxurious eastern gateways through which rushed 
a swift and ever-increasing flood of emigrants. 
Mere words or even figures can hardly convey 
what this movement of population meant to the 
country. It was said that in 1838 five thousand 
people left Buffalo in one day to go up the lakes, 
and the larger part of them went to stay. In 
181 1 Michigan had only nine principal settle- 
ments, with a total population of under five thou- 
sand, four-fifths of whom were French; in 1837, 
when she was admitted as a state into the Union, 
she had a population of over 175,000, distributed 
over thirty-one counties, nearly two-thirds of 
whom were from New England and western New 
York. Together the five states of Ohio, Indiana, 
Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin had come in 
1837 to have nearly three million inhabitants. 

Another picture of the rapid growth of the 
country is given in the successive additions to a 
series of " Travellers' Guides," published between 
1825 and 1840 by Gideon Davison. He wrote 
for tourists, not emigrants, and entitled each book 
"The Fashionable Tour in 1825" or whatever 
the year might be. In the first edition, published 
in 1825, he included in the western part of his 



268 The Story of the Great Lakes 

journey only an excursion from Albany to Niag- 
ara, and thence to Montreal and Quebec. Five 
years later, in the fourth edition, a two-page de- 
scription of the western lakes was inserted, with 
a mention of Mackinac and Green Bay, military 
posts which steamboats from Buffalo occasionally 
visited during the summer. A footnote an- 
nounced that steamboats left Buffalo for Detroit 
every other day, stopping at Erie, Grand River, 
Cleveland, and Sandusky (cabin fare ^15), and 
a line of boats ran daily to Erie. All description 
of the lakes is, however, as " the sources of the 
Niagara, a river inferior in splendor to none, 
perhaps, in the world," and the account is inserted 
to give a more adequate idea of the vast amount 
of water united in this "stupendous river." In 
1834 the notice of these steamboats which ran 
every other day to Detroit in forty hours is set 
in contrast with the conditions of 181 1, when a 
passage from Buffalo to Detroit required from five 
to seven days, and the traveller was liable to wait 
ten days for a schooner and a fair wind. In the 
seventh and eighth editions, of 1837 and 1840, 
even fashion had come to recognize the lakes. 
A full western trip on Lakes Erie, Huron, and 
Michigan is outlined, and steamers are reported 



The Great Lakes in 1840 269 

to leave Buffalo for Detroit daily in 1837 and 
twice a day in 1840. Had the editions been 
continued for fifteen years, a trip to Lake Supe- 
rior would have been included ; indeed, it began 
to be taken by 1845 ^7 some travellers. 

Davison's guide-books were the most conserva- 
tive of the many " Companions," " Directories,*' 
and " Gazetteers with Immigrant Guides " pub- 
lished at that time. Although Davison would 
not send his tourist so far, there was in all these 
years a rush of western travel on the lakes. A 
guide-book of 1825, Davison's first year, contains 
an advertisement of the steamboat Superior, which 
ran between Buffalo and Detroit from April to 
November, occupying four days each way and 
landing passengers at Cleveland and the other 
main settlements " unless prevented by stress of 
weather." This steamboat had, besides its prin- 
cipal cabin, a forward room fitted up especially 
for families moving westward, where nothing but 
ship room and access to the kitchen was supplied, 
and the fare was only seven dollars and a half, 
one-half the regular cabin fare. 

A landowner from Boston published in 1838 a 
little book, " Illinois and the West," which aimed 
to give to others contemplating land purchases 



270 The Story of the Great Lakes 

an account of those of his experiences as a west- 
ern traveller which might be of value to them. 
He explained the simple method by which the 
government divided the new territories and states, 
and sold lots to newcomers. The whole country 
was surveyed by five principal meridian lines run- 
ning due north and south, and intersected by 
lines running east and west. Parallel in both 
directions to these main lines ran lines six miles 
apart which divided the country into so-called 
townships exactly six miles square. These town- 
ships were mere geographical divisions and had 
nothing to do with the political and social system 
of villages and towns. Indeed, an actual town 
might happen to be in two or even three of these 
paper townships. At the government land of- 
fices, of which there were ten in Illinois, were 
maps on which these six-mile squares were 
divided in their turn into sections a mile square, 
and numbered with the section as a unit. The 
section was not, however, the unit of purchase, 
but might be cut according to the wish of the 
buyer and the character of the land into fourths, 
eighths, sixteenths, and even " fractions " and 
" excesses and deficiencies " as proved necessary. 
The latter divisions were only used when the 



The Great Lakes in 1840 271 

regular system had to be interrupted by old and 
irregular claims, or streams, or parts of established 
townships. From the agents the emigrant could 
buy a sixteenth of a section, or forty acres, for 
fifty dollars. As the western fever sent the first 
settlers farther west, partially cultivated farms 
came into the market, and by 1835 ^^^ prices 
of farms ranged from two to ten dollars an acre, 
according to the amount of improvement of the 
property, and by paying the higher prices a new- 
comer could avoid the first clearing of the land 
and the erection of a log cabin or frame-house. 
Such an opening up of country as came in this 
decade between 1830 and 1840 attracted many 
travellers to the lake region. By picturing from 
their various accounts a " Grand Tour " of the 
lakes as it was taken by many a person between 

1837 and 1843, ^^ ^^^ g^^ ^^^ ^^s^ ^^^^ °^ ^^^ 
various settlements. The traveller usually came 
up the Erie Canal and started from Buffalo, 
taking from there one of the well-appointed 
steamers of from four hundred to seven hundred 
tons which left in the morning and evening for 
Detroit. This trip would always be taken in the 
summer, for during the four or five months when 
the lake was closed Detroit could only be reached 



272 The Story of the Great Lakes 

by a stage journey of three hundred and seventy 
miles along the shore of Lake Erie. The towns 
of Erie, Cleveland, and Sandusky were the main 
stops between Buffalo and Detroit, but between 
them was a succession of villages which were just 
beginning to give signs of their future importance 
as the terminus of some railroad or canal. The 
steamer sailed along the southern edge of the 
lake, keeping always in sight of land, and gave 
the passengers a good view of Dunkirk, a little 
village which was waiting for the completion of 
the New York and Erie Railroad, and of the 
towns of Portland and Erie. This last-named 
had always been the point at which to turn 
southward into Pennsylvania, and was now made 
all the more important by the termination there 
of the Pennsylvania and Erie Canal, which con- 
nected Lake Erie with Pittsburg. Between 
Erie and Cleveland, Conneaut, Ashtabula, and 
Grand River were the principal settlements. 

Cleveland had been incorporated as a city in 
1836, and was rightly considered one of the most 
attractive cities of the West. Standing on a plain 
eighty feet above the surface of the lake, from 
the steamer's deck it made a beautiful picture. 
Above the roofs of the well-built brick blocks 



The Great Lakes in 1840 273 

and the residences in their carefully laid-out rows, 
towered the white dome of the court-house, four 
church spires, and the turrets of its hotels. The 
hotels of the city were particularly praised by 
travellers. On the roofs of the two principal 
ones, the " American " and the " Franklin," were 
towers in which sentinels stood on watch day and 
night, keeping a lookout for vessels and notifying 
those below of their approach in time to send 
runners to the wharf to meet the guests. The 
remarkable growth of the town in the last few 
years was particularly attributed to its being the 
terminus of the Ohio and Erie Canal, making 
it one of the principal routes of trade and travel 
from the Ohio. Along this canal a side excur- 
sion to Cincinnati and Columbus was often made. 
From Cleveland the boat proceeded with only 
two stops, at Black River and Huron, to San- 
dusky Bay, and steamed past the lighthouse and 
up the carefully staked-out channel to the town 
of Sandusky, which was at the bottom of the 
seven-mile inlet. This town had the fresh, bright 
appearance of all the recently built settlements, 
with an added air of substantiality which it owed 
to the abundance near by of good building ma- 
terial, which had led the inhabitants to erect fine 



274 The Story of the Great Lakes 

stone residences. After a brief stop the steamer 
ran out of the bay and northward across the lake 
to the mouth of the Detroit River, passing on 
the way the islands near which Commodore 
Perry won his victory. At the entrance of the 
strait on the Canada side was the town of Am- 
herstburgh, formerly known as Maiden, and the 
scene of much fighting in the War of 1812. All 
the twenty miles of shore from here to Detroit 
were lined with pretty villas and gardens, many 
of them of the old French style. 

To the traveller of 1840 as to the tourist of 
to-day, Detroit made from the water a most 
pleasing picture. For a mile along the bank 
of the river and half a mile back from the water 
stretched regular avenues with large white houses 
and green patches of gardens interspersed, and 
in the centre of the city were the court-house with 
its dome and turrets, the churches with their tall 
spires, and the blocks of solid brick business 
buildings. The low-lying French buildings had 
disappeared, and with them the French atmosphere 
of twenty years before. Detroit had become in 
the last ten years a busy port and thoroughfare 
for the emigrants who yearly composed one-half 
or even two-thirds of the city population. Even 



The Great Lakes In 1840 275 

in 1 830 they were arriving by the thousands, — 
ten, even fifteen thousand in a single season. In 
May of that year the Free Press of the city an- 
nounced that besides those arriving by land or by 
sailing vessels, over two thousand people had 
come in that one week on the seven steamboats. 
In 1836 a diligent citizen kept watch of those 
who came and went, and computed that, in the 
twelve hours between daylight and dark, a wagon 
left the city for the interior every five minutes. 

The pioneers who had started out from Detroit 
in 1832— 1834 to found Chicago and the other 
towns beyond, had to go in primitive fashion by 
mail-coach, by flatboats with Indian guides, by 
schooner, or whatever conveyance they could get 
for any part of the way. For the traveller of 
1840 there were three regular and established 
routes by any one of which he would be 
reasonably comfortable. One was by steamer 
through the lakes, but this he more com- 
monly took on his return trip. A second 
was by railroad to Ypsilanti, thirty-three miles 
away, from which a regular line of stages ran to 
St. Joseph on Lake Michigan, one hundred and 
seventy miles across the state, and thence by 
steamer the remaining ninety-two miles to Chi- 



276 The Story of the Great Lakes 

cago. The stages travelled along the govern- 
ment road (about twenty miles north of the 
present boundary of the state) and found the 
whole way lined with tiny hamlets and cleared 
farms in the midst of dense forests. The most 
common route lay just south of this with Toledo 
as a starting-point. The traveller would take 
the steamer down the Detroit River and along 
the western end of the lake and go up the 
Maumee River nine miles to Toledo, a town 
of three or four thousand people, destined, said 
the guide-book, to be a place of much impor- 
tance. As by the other route, he could go thirty- 
three miles by railroad, this time to Adrian, 
which was as far as the road had been built, and 
thence across the state through the newly oc- 
cupied country to Michigan City, Indiana, which 
was then the " commercial depot '' for the entire 
northern part of that state. This town was soon 
to be benefited by a branch from Fort Wayne 
of the Wabash and Erie Canal, which was 
then in progress and was to find its outlet at 
Toledo. This route left only a trip of fifty-five 
miles by water to Chicago. 

At Chicago the visitor stopped to wonder, as 
men have stopped to wonder ever since. The 



The Great Lakes in 1840 277 

splendid location of the town as a commercial 
thoroughfare between the lakes and the Missis- 
sippi had made it an easy victim to the land- 
boom of 1834 and 1835, ^"^ ^^- Buckingham, 
visiting there in 1840, was told by persons who 
had been present at the time that building lots 
on streets only marked out on paper had been 
sold over and over again in a day, with an 
advance of price each time until the evening 
purchaser was likely, at the very least, to pay ten 
times as much as the morning buyer of the same 
lot. Chicago had, however, been able to survive 
the succeeding panic in 1837, which swamped for 
the time being several smaller towns. It was now 
a prosperous trading centre of six thousand 
people. The town was planned with the sym- 
metry of all these newly built cities, and the 
streets were of good width with rows of trees 
separating the plank sidewalks from the main 
road. None of the streets were as yet paved ; 
and indeed many of them had still the green turf 
of the prairie grass in the centre. So scarce was 
stone and so high was labor that a small piece of 
flagstone pavement around the Lake House 
Hotel had cost nine hundred dollars, — an 
extravagance which no one else had yet com- 



278 The Story of the Great Lakes 

mitted. On the south side of the river were the 
stores, many of them built of brick, and the 
main street was a busy trading mart. There 
were in the city six churches, four hotels, banks, 
and insurance offices, and along the water front 
stretched a growing line of warehouses. The 
fashionable residential district was on the north 
side of the river, where were avenues of large 
villas surrounded by gardens. Between the two 
parts ran a ferry-boat, drawn across the river by 
a rope, and passing and repassing every five 
minutes. This was maintained by subscription 
among the inhabitants, and no fee was therefore 
charged for crossing. 

Margaret Fuller spent the summer of 1843 on 
the lakes, and left a charming account of her 
impressions. Chicago she found rather commer- 
cial, " with no provision for the student or the 
idler," but she recognized its commanding posi- 
tion. " There can be no two places in the world 
more completely thoroughfares," she says, " than 
this place and Buffalo." They were to her two 
correspondent valves that opened and shut all 
the time, as the life blood rushed from east to 
west and back again. Yet, even in this business 
place, she saw for the first time in her drives 



The Great Lakes in 1840 279 

along the lake shore the beautiful prairie flowers 
of the West. To her the most picturesque sight 
in all Chicago were the lines of Hoosier wagons, 
in which the rough farmers who had driven in 
from the country camped on the edge of the city, 
living on their own supplies of provisions and 
seeming as they walked about the town like 
foreign peasantry put down among the " active, 
inventive business people " of Chicago. With 
the characteristically sharp contrasts of this won- 
derful new land, the other sight which interested 
her especially was the arrival of the great lake 
steamers, magnificent floating palaces of six and 
eight hundred tons, which "panted in from their 
rapid and marvellous journey " of a thousand 
miles from Bufl'alo. When she went out to 
watch the lights of these boats as they came in 
at night she heard as she walked along on one 
side the Hoosier dialect, on another, cultivated 
French, and the very next moment the sounds 
of German, Dutch, and Irish. Then as now 
Chicago was a cosmopohtan city. 

Miss Fuller found the boats so comfortable 
that her trip to Milwaukee was a " pleasure 
party." The beautiful situation of this town on 
a bluflF eighty feet above Lake Michigan made 



28o The Story of the Great Lakes 

a great impression on all visitors. If the other 
towns had grown up recently and rapidly, Mil- 
waukee could be seen in the very process. With 
a population of only two thousand people, who 
were erecting buildings as quickly as they could on 
newly laid-out broad avenues, it had received in 
one week from Buffalo three thousand emigrants 
on their way to the interior, not to mention 
the numbers which came weekly from Chicago 
and Ohio. Here, as at Chicago, Miss Fuller was 
delighted at the gathering of pleasant people 
drawn from all over the world. The great 
interest of the town was in its new arrivals. 
Boats came and went every day, and crowds 
swarmed down to the pier to meet them. The 
poorer emigrants who landed were taken to rude 
" shantees '' in a particular part of the town, and 
then walked off the next morning into the 
country, " the mothers carrying the babies, and 
the fathers leading the little children." She 
stayed only a fortnight at Milwaukee, but she 
declares that had she been rich in money she 
might in that time have built a house or set 
herself up in business, so swiftly did matters 
move there. 

Leaving Milwaukee Miss Fuller went by 



The Great Lakes in 1840 281 

steamer, as did all lake travellers, to Mackinac, 
crossing Lake Michigan and passing near the 
beautiful western shores of the state of that 
name. All steamers stopped at Manitoulin Is- 
land for wood. They could not carry the very 
large amount of this fuel needed for their thou- 
sand-mile trips without so lumbering the decks as 
to lose the necessary space for passengers and 
cargo. So they must stop at this way-place and 
pay to the twenty wood-cutters who lived there 
an exorbitant price for wood enough to carry 
them the remaining one hundred miles to Mack- 
inac. As the engines consumed a cord and a 
half an hour, the decks, immediately after the 
taking on of a new supply, were heavily loaded 
down, so that even the windows of the staterooms 
were darkened until the piles began to diminish. 

Mackinac, or Mackinaw, was out of the path 
of emigration and had scarcely changed in the 
last thirty years. Always a centre for Indian 
traders and American Fur Company buyers, it 
was doubly picturesque when Margaret Fuller 
reached there in August, 1843, ^^^ ^^^^ ^^° 
thousand Indians had just come in from distant 
villages and made their camps, waiting for trade 
and for the annual payments made them by the 



a82 The Story of the Great Lakes 

government. Of the beauty of the scenery and 
of the interest of these constantly arriving Indian 
parties Miss Fuller could not say enough. She 
stayed there nearly a fortnight, and made one 
day an excursion by steamer up to Sault Ste. 
Marie, where two Indians took her in a canoe 
through the rapids. To all travellers the days 
on the Strait of Mackinac were among the most 
pleasant of the trip, but when the steamer came 
from Chicago they reluctantly bade farewell to its 
beauties and sailed down the transparent waters 
of Lake Huron to the strait which led into Lake 
St. Clair and across that lake to Detroit, and 
thence back along Lake Erie, as they had come, 
to Buffalo. 

In taking the "Grand Tour" with one of 
these travellers, we have gained a picture of the 
beginnings of the western lake states and of the 
rapid progress of the eastern ones in a time not 
remote and distant, but scarcely seventy years 
ago. The accomplishment of so much in so 
short a time well deserved the adjectives and 
encomiums that were bestowed upon it by admir- 
ing travellers, who little dreamed of the vast 
changes that were to take place in the century 
to come. 



CHAPTER XXII 

THE COMING OF THE RAILROAD TO LAKE ERIE 

LAKE Erie became in the nineteenth cen- 
tury the portal of the Great Lakes. To 
her shores came from the east an army of 
immigrants pouring into the states beyond, and 
from these regions, as they became populated, came 
back an immense volume of produce to be carried 
to the cities of the east and the south. These 
conditions led the citizens of the lake shore 
promptly to adopt any new means of transporta- 
tion. In its day they had welcomed the turnpike 
and built many roads into the interior. During 
the era of canal-building the people of New York, 
Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana had spent hun- 
dreds of thousands of dollars on artificial water- 
ways. In 1 840 five canals over a thousand miles 
in length, not including their many branches, 
opened into Lake Erie. The Welland Canal 
united it with Lake Ontario, the Erie with the 
Hudson, while the Ohio and Erie connected 

283 



284 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Cleveland with Columbus and the Ohio and also 
with the Pennsylvania Canal and thus with Pitts- 
burg; and from Toledo and the Maumee River 
the Miami Canal went south to Cincinnati, and 
the Wabash and Erie west to Lafayette, Indiana. 
This remarkable group of canals had been built 




•n 
s 

MlchigaDj 

City, 






'Saginaw; 
^ , Pontial 

Lansing ^«lg(,^ 
^alamaioo 'Cl^-it^ 












><^^Li?'^ 



r,w 



.e-^V^^ 



Ifew York ( 



Mansfield;^ 
/ 
I „ 



jlndianapoli? 



Daytoni 



B7 CANAL AND RAILROAD 
TO 

LAKE ERIE 

I Canal 
n i l I I I liailroad 



in twenty years. No less wonderful was the build- 
ing of railroad lines in the next two decades ; and 
to us who are accustomed to limited trains and 
" flyers " the story of the first trains is one of 
curious interest. 

Ohio and Michigan were progressive in the 
matter of building railroads. Michigan gave a 
charter to the Michigan Central in 1830, and in 
1832, when there were only two hundred and 
twenty-nine miles of railroad in operation in the 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 285 

United States, the Ohio legislature granted a 
charter for the construction of a road from San- 
dusky to Dayton, a distance of over one hundred 
and fifty miles. These early dates are rather an 
exhibition of good intentions and foresight than 
a measure of actual achievement, for neither road 
was begun until 1837 and then each was car- 
ried but a few miles. All railroad-building about 
the lakes until nearly the middle of the century 
was a matter of crude and small beginnings, but 
it is these very beginnings which make us realize 
the transformations that have taken place within 
less than eighty years. 

The first railroad to be built in Ohio was the 
Kalamazoo and Erie from Toledo, Ohio, to 
Adrian, Michigan. This was later bought up 
by the Michigan Southern road and was the 
first link in the route to Chicago, taken, as will 
be remembered, by our traveller of 1840. It 
was thirty-three miles long and was a typical 
early railroad. Seven-eighths of it was built in 
unbroken forest, and one-third through a densely 
timbered swamp where malaria and mosquitoes 
made the lives of the workmen miserable. The 
track was built of oak stringers, or long wooden 
beams, upon which were fastened strips of iron 



2 86 The Story of the Great Lakes 

five-eighths of an inch thick and two and a half 
inches wide. These rails were supported by 
wooden cross-ties placed about four feet apart 
and resting securely on a heavy foundation of 
broken stone. The cars were built after the 
fashion of the body of a stage-coach, or rather 
of three stage-coaches put together, and were 
set on a four-wheeled truck instead of directly 
on wheels, to make it possible for them to 
swing round on curves. The conductor walked 
along an outside footboard to collect fares. 
These cars opened at either end and seated 
about twenty-four persons, who faced to the front. 
On the Toledo road a horse track was laid be- 
tween the rails, and the road was used for one 
year with horse power. In 1837 a locomotive 
was purchased and steam power was substituted. 
For ten years American builders had been 
experimenting with types of locomotives and had 
adopted a pattern which has persisted to this day 
in its principles, although it has been much 
changed in details and size. The fore part of 
the engine was placed on a four-wheeled truck 
and fastened to it with a bolt, which allowed 
the truck to swing some distance and thus to 
round sharp curves safely. The back part rested 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 287 

on four connected driving wheels. An engine 
of this type had been built in 1836 in Phila- 
delphia, and was speedily adopted elsewhere. It 
weighed about ten tons when water and coal 
tanks were loaded, and would seem to us to-day 
a crude and small affair, but it was better suited 
to wooden rails than a heavier engine would 
have been. Passengers paid four and a half 
cents a mile to be carried on this Toledo rail- 
road at a speed of less than ten miles an hour. 
The leisureliness and timidity of the first trains 
would seem to us amazing, did we not remember 
how tiny the engine was, how unstable the road- 
bed, and how loosely the cars were coupled to- 
gether by bolt and pin. Twenty years after this 
first road was built one of the printed instructions 
to engineers was to be perfectly sure before they 
pulled out of the station that they had their en- 
tire train with them and had dropped no cars in 
starting. At first it was the custom for the 
engineer to stop the train to collect fares, or for 
any other urgent business connected with the 
road. It was many years before the companies 
dared run night trains. The Michigan Central, 
which was opened in 1837, found in the autumn 
of 1 841 that its depots were so loaded with 



288 The Story of the Great Lakes 

barrels of flour and cords of wood that they 
would not be able to get it all to Detroit before 
the close of navigation on the lakes. The di- 
rectors conferred together and hired teams to 
transport the goods from stations near Detroit to 
that place. For the long distances they had no 
alternative but to put one of their four locomo- 
tives on for night service, but they considered it 
unsafe and hoped that such extreme measures 
would not be necessary in the future. When 
this road had been opened, four years before, an 
adventurous young man who owned a sorrel pony 
announced that he was going to race the train for 
the last mile before it reached Dearborn. The 
crowds who had been assembled to see the first 
train come in were much excited over the com- 
petition, and, needless to say, the pony won. 

After the completion of these and other short 
roads there was a lull in railroad-building, due to 
the hard times in the western country which suc- 
ceeded the panic of 1837. In 1845 ^^^ 1846 the 
legislatures began once more to plan internal im- 
provements, and a great era of railroad-building 
began which continued until the opening of the 
Civil War. In the history of Lake Erie 1851 
stands out as the year when three of the trunk 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 289 

lines were completed and their opening fittingly 
celebrated. In that year the first train came into 
Cleveland, and with the thought of the hundreds 
of trains that enter its stations daily, let us put 
ourselves back into the city of 1851 and watch 
the first train arrive. 

The state legislature had voted to loan to the 
credit of the city 1 200,000 for the construction 
of the Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati 
Railroad. In 1851 the road-bed of two hundred 
and sixty-three miles was completed, and on the 
morning of February 21 was formally opened 
by the passage over the road of a party of four 
hundred and twenty-eight persons, who took the 
train from Columbus and Cincinnati to Cleveland, 
the " city of the Lake Shore." The party was 
made up of members of the legislature, officers of 
the state, the councils of both cities, and many 
citizens. The road over which these people 
travelled was a very different one from the 
Toledo road of fourteen years before, and from 
the number of people accommodated it is evident 
that the passenger coaches were very different, 
also. Iron rails had taken the place of wooden 
ones, and heavier locomotives and more comfort- 
able cars had been built. When the excursion 
u 



290 The Story of the Great Lakes 

train reached the city of Cleveland, thousands of 
citizens were lined up along the track and about 
the station and the cannon of the city boomed 
out a loud welcome to the incoming guests. The 
party had arrived late in the day, as it was a 
twelve-hour journey. The next morning a 
procession of Cleveland people was formed, with 
General Sanford as chief marshal, to escort the 
guests to the public square in front of the court- 
house, where the mayor received them with a 
speech of welcome. He was followed by Mr. 
Convers, speaker of the senate, Mr. Starkweather, 
who spoke for the people of Cleveland, three 
gentlemen from Cincinnati, and the governor of 
the state, Mr. Wood, who was a Cleveland resi- 
dent. Last on the programme came Mr. Cyrus 
Prentiss, the president of the Cleveland and 
Pittsburg Railroad, forty miles of which were also 
opened that day. This road ran to Ravenna, 
where passengers could take the canal packet to 
Beaver River, and there transfer to a steamboat 
for Pittsburg. Mr. Prentiss invited the guests to 
take an excursion on that road. After that trip 
they returned to a banquet and grand torchlight 
procession in the evening. 

In their pulpits on Sunday the ministers dis- 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 291 

coursed on the wonderful event that had taken 

place, the arrival of the railroad, and on Monday 

morning the people gathered from all the region 

round to see the strange iron horse start back 

across the state with its load. Just before the 

train pulled out of the station, one of the visiting 

party sang a humorous song, describing the effect 

of the trip upon the interior regions of the state. 

He told of the delight and astonishment of 

mothers and children in their log cabins, and of 

wood-choppers of the back country as they had 

looked up and seen this " snorting iron horse 

with the long tail " race through the country. 

He ended his song with praise of the governor 

Cleveland had given the state and of Cleveland 

itself, 

**The beautiful city, the forest-tree city. 
The city upon the lake shore." 

The opening up of the Venango oil-district in 
Pennsylvania in 1858 brought to Cleveland a 
large refining and shipping industry, for which 
it was well fitted by its advantageous position on 
the lake and its railroads and vessels. 

Two months later a similar occasion took place 
in the little village of Dunkirk, Pennsylvania, 
when the New York and Erie road was com- 



292 The Story of the Great Lakes 

pleted. This Hne crossed the state of New 
York some seventy miles south of the Albany 
turnpike and New York Central route, and with 
its completion the Great Lakes and the Atlantic 
were once more united and the occasion was 
celebrated as if such an idea had never entered 
the minds of any one before. President Fill- 
more and Daniel Webster, his Secretary of State, 
with three other members of the cabinet, came on 
from Washington and took the trip on the first 
train over the road. In New York City and all 
along the way there was great excitement, and in 
the little village of Dunkirk grand prepara- 
tions had been going on for weeks. The train 
arrived at four-thirty on the afternoon of 
May 15. As it rolled into the station the 
church bells rang, cannon roared, and a salute 
of thirteen guns was fired from the United States 
steamship Michigan^ which was stationed in the 
harbor. The cars passed under a canopy of 
French, American, and British flags, and beyond 
the engine at the very end of the track was an 
arch of evergreen and flowers built over an old 
plough on which was printed the word " Finis.'* 
This was the plough used to break ground for 
the first ten-mile section of the road at Dunkirk 
in 1838. 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 293 

The distinguished visitors formed in a proces- 
sion and marched about the town, to be welcomed 
by the mayor before they entered the huge shed 
erected for the occasion. Over the table, three 
hundred feet long, hung two barbecued oxen sus- 
pended on poles. Upon the table were ten sheep 
roasted whole. Bread had been baked in loaves 
ten feet long by two thick, which it took two men 
to carry. Even the pork and beans were in tin 
vessels holding fifty gallons each, and barrels of 
cider were set at intervals along the side of the 
table. The presidential party looked, admired, 
and praised — and then returned to the hotel for a 
collation, leaving the sampling of these triumphs 
of the culinary art to the other guests of the 
occasion. 

From the window of the hotel the great men 
made speeches in the evening. President Fillmore 
and Senator Douglas leading and being followed 
by ex-Governor Seward and others. This group 
was of great interest to the political world as hav- 
ing six presidential candidates in its ranks — Fill- 
more, Crittenden, Douglas, Seward, Marcy, and 
Webster. The last-named was to have spoken 
that night, but he was so hoarse from previous 
efforts that he could only say a few words in 



294 The Story of the Great Lakes 

answer to the calls of the people for him, and 
postponed his speech until the next night. With 
suitable eclat, the ocean and the lakes were once 
more " forever united,'* this time in very truth, by 
a service which took only twenty hours in contrast 
to the three days of the Erie Canal. In the words 
of one of the banners in the hall, " 'Tis done, — 
'tis done, the mighty chain that binds bright Erie 
to the main." 

" Bright Erie " was not yet connected as closely 
as the public might naturally demand, as was 
shown by the famous Erie war of 1853. On all 
the roads between what are to-day the great cities 
of the country there ran one or at most two trains 
a day. Even on the New York and Erie itself, 
which was one of the fastest and best equipped in 
the matter of service, the mail train ran one-half 
the distance in one day, and then stopped over- 
night at Elmira before it proceeded on its way. 
These arrangements made it very necessary that 
the traveller should make good connections and 
that the various roads should run in harmony, for 
each piece was operated by a separate company. 
Besides this there was another complication. 
The tracks of different roads were of different 
gauges or widths, so that the train of one could 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 295 

not by any possibility be run on another. This 
condition of affairs was particularly bad at Erie, 
twenty miles beyond Dunkirk, where all pas- 
sengers had to leave the cars, ride across the town 
in omnibuses, or walk a mile to the other station, 
and if connections failed, as they often did, dine 
or even stay overnight in the town. This state 
of affairs was satisfactory to the local hotel and 
baggage men and others who gained from the 
opportunities offered by a large transfer of bag- 
gage and people, but it was very annoying to 
travellers. The railroad manager of the eastern 
road decided to alter the gauge of his road and 
attempt an arrangement by which passengers 
could be carried through direct to Cleveland. 
He began by buying up all the stock he could of 
the other line. This was the pioneer attempt at 
a railroad merger and resulted in one of the most 
bitter local wars the country has ever known, 
involving every one in the region and the people 
of both states in a protracted and very serious 
struggle. The issue was complicated and inten- 
sified by state and railroad rivalry, but the whole 
affair began because the people of Erie were un- 
willing to be made a " way-station," as they termed 
it, on a through route and thus lose the commer- 



296 The Story of the Great Lakes 

cial advantages of being a terminus for railroads 
and steamboat lines. 

On the morning of December 7, 1853, the 
citizens of Erie were summoned by the ringing 
of the court-house bell. Men rushed to the 
centre of the town to find that the eastern rail- 
road company had begun work at the state line 
altering their road from their four-feet-ten-inches 
gauge to the six-foot width of the western railway. 
As the road ran for a short distance through the 
street of the town the municipal authorities had 
refused a permit for change, but the company 
had begun, nevertheless. After listening to im- 
passioned speechmaking from the court-house 
steps till it was thoroughly roused, the crowd, 
led by the mayor, started for the wooden railroad 
bridge. They found it guarded by employees 
of the railroad, who were soon scattered by a 
shower of rotten eggs and other missiles. The 
mob then attacked the bridge, tore up the tracks 
and the timber, and returned triumphantly to the 
city. Two days later a similar mob tore up 
the track, destroyed the bridge, and ploughed the 
road at Harbor Creek, seven miles east of Erie. 
Mob-rule had come in earnest. 

It was two months before a single train got 



Coming of the Railroad to Lake Erie 297 

through to any point near these places, and it was 
three years before the matter was finally adjusted. 
The courts and the state militia became involved. 
State feeling ran high between Ohio, Pennsyl- 
vania, and New York over the question of their 
local gauges, and the press of the whole country 
took sides in the matter. Passengers and freight 
had to be transferred during the winter months, 
when the lake was closed, by wagon from the 
stop east of Erie to the stop west of that town, a 
process that was called " Crossing the Isthmus." 
But still the Erie people rallied with the 
watchword, " Break gauge at Erie, or have no 
railroad." 

Horace Greeley, going west at this time, had 
to ride the seven miles across the " Isthmus " in 
an open sleigh through a severe storm of wind, 
snow, and sleet, and after that the railroad man- 
agers and the townspeople were continually 
denounced in the New York Tribune, " Let 
Erie be avoided by all travellers," he wrote on 
his return, " until grass shall grow in her streets, 
and till her piemen in despair shall move away to 
some other city." 

Homes of railroad officers and sympathizers 
were mobbed by the " Rippers," as the opponents 



298 The Story of the Great Lakes 

of the road were called because of their violent 
methods. The bridge at Harbor Creek was 
rebuilt by the company four times, only to have 
it burned or torn down. At last when the whole 
town was spHt into bitter factions and all united 
local spirit was for the time being destroyed, the 
courts and legislature settled the matter. The 
railroad company, having made certain conces- 
sions to Erie interests, was allowed to change to 
a compromise gauge of four feet eight and a half 
inches (that of the New York Central road) and 
run trains through Erie on what is now a part of 
the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad. 
The great era of consolidation which was to create 
our transcontinental lines had begun. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS IN CHICAGO 

IN the last years before the Civil War, Illinois 
became a political storm centre to which 
the eyes of the whole nation were turned. 
Reaching farther south than any other lake state, 
and bounded on the west by the Mississippi 
River, — the main artery of trade and travel of 
the south, — she was bound geographically and 
commercially to the south. But on the other 
hand she reached north to Lake Michigan, a 
part of the great system of inland waterways of 
the North. More than any other state she pre- 
sented in miniature the condition of the nation, 
divided thus between north and south. More- 
over her settlers, moving westward along the 
lines of latitude, had come from both sections. 
With a southern sentiment in those counties that 
were nearest to Kentucky and Missouri, she 
combined in her upper counties men from New 
England, New York, and Pennsylvania with the 

299 



joo The Story of the Great Lakes 

strongest northern principles. Seeing within her 
own bounds the elements of the great national 
conflict, she became a state whose strongest 
sentiment was for union, for which in the last 
analysis all her best political leaders stood. 

Into this state came Abraham Lincoln and 
Stephen Arnold Douglas when they were young 
men, Lincoln from Kentucky after a stay in 
Indiana, and Douglas from Vermont by way of 
New York State. In Illinois these two men 
fought out in the decade before the Civil War 
the great contest of the two national parties of 
the time. The campaign of 1858, with its 
famous series of joint debates between them, was 
opened in Chicago by speeches of Douglas and 
Lincoln from the balcony of the Tremont House. 
In Chicago the National RepubHcan Convention 
nominated Lincoln for President on the i6th of 
May, i860. To a royal welcome in Chicago 
Douglas returned in the spring of 1861 after his 
noble and disinterested support of his elected 
rival and his patriotic efforts for the preservation 
of the Union. Here within a few weeks he died. 
Before we pass to the story of these events in 
Chicago we must learn a little more of the con- 
dition of affairs in the lake states during the 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 301 

interval since the War of 1 8 1 2. Of the growth of 
their cities and of their great prosperity we shall 
speak in detail in later chapters. It is sufficient 
to say that the movement of population, of wealth, 
and of power into the West had become so great 
that the Republicans in i860 considered Chicago 
the fitting place for their national convention. 

Of the definite problems of the great sectional 
contest, the lake states had a concrete as well as a 
theoretic knowledge. They were located on the 
northern frontier of the United States, and they 
dipped down from one hundred and fifty to two 
hundred and sixty miles into the south. Inevi- 
tably they became the scene of fugitive slave 
migration. In spite of the strict laws of the 
United States and the bitter protests of the 
South, the escaped slave found friends when he 
slipped over the border into the free states, and 
was helped by them into Canada, where his safety 
was assured. Since 18 15 there had been a regu- 
larly organized system of passing these runaways 
from one place to another on the northern route, 
a system which so baffled and mystified the 
unsuccessful masters in their search that they had 
given it the name of the " Underground Rail- 
road." The route through Ohio was the short- 



302 The Story of the Great Lakes 

est of these lines. Only a little more than two 
hundred miles lay between the slave states south 
of the Ohio River and freedom. Along the river 
were twenty-two or twenty-three stations, and 
every port on Lake Erie was a point of depar- 
ture. The five principal outlets were Toledo, San- 
dusky, Cleveland, Ashtabula, and Fairport, and 
through these stations there was an ever increas- 
ing procession of fugitives. Within this one 
state it has been calculated that there were nearly 
three thousand miles of "underground road." 
Western Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Illinois had 
their roads, converging at Erie, Detroit, To- 
ledo, Michigan City, and Chicago. Such was the 
anti-slavery sentiment on which Lincoln could rely. 
A hasty sketch of the lives of Lincoln and 
Douglas before their speeches in Chicago in 
1858 will show the typical western conditions 
which had put them in their leading positions. 
Douglas was forty-five years old, Lincoln four 
years older. Born in Brandon, Vermont, Stephen 
Arnold Douglas was the son of a young physician, 
whose father was Benajah Douglass,^ a New York 
pioneer who had moved to Vermont and there 
been prominent in local politics, and whose 

1 The elder Douglass spelled his name with a double s. 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 303 

mother was Martha Arnold, a descendant of 
Governor William Arnold of Rhode Island. 
Dr. Douglass had married Sally Fisk, the 
daughter of a prosperous farmer. He died when 
Stephen was very young, and the widow and 
children went to live with their mother's bachelor 
brother on the Fisk farm. Here Stephen lived 
the life of a healthy Vermont boy until the 
marriage of his uncle and the birth of a son 
changed his standing in the family. When the 
boy began to propose going to Brandon Academy 
to prepare for college, his uncle told him kindly 
that he could not provide for his further educa- 
tion. Stephen in a fit of boyish anger left the 
farm and apprenticed himself to a cabinet-maker 
in Middlebury. He stayed with him for a year, 
delighting in the novelty of the life and in the 
companionship with a group of young men with 
whom he could discuss politics and eulogize his 
favorite hero, Andrew Jackson ; but, nevertheless, 
he grew weary of the humble position of appren- 
tice. After two years with this man and with 
another cabinet-maker, he gave up the trade and 
returned to the home of his mother, enrolling 
himself at Brandon Academy. 

The marriage of his sister and later of his 



304 The Story of the Great Lakes 

mother started the boy at the age of seventeen 
on his westward journeying. It put him into 
Canandaigua, New York, where he pursued his 
studies at its excellent academy for three years, 
and prepared for his later career by studying law 
out of school in the offices of local attorneys. 
The western fever was upon him, and life on one 
of the great channels of westward migration in- 
duced him in the spring of 1833, against the 
wishes of his relatives and friends, to start for 
Buffalo and the tempting world beyond. 

Douglas's first six months in the new country 
were marked by hardship and by a serious illness. 
Lack of funds drove him to teaching in a little 
Illinois village in place of practising law as he had 
hoped. Within a year, however, the penniless 
boy had been admitted to the Illinois bar, by 
what must have been a very simple examination, 
and was happily established in a law office in the 
court-house at Jacksonville, Illinois. From 
this time on law was subordinated to his chosen 
pursuit, politics, for which his read}^ comradeship, 
his acute intelligence, and his keen ambition 
fitted him admirably. He filled at astonishingly 
early ages several minor positions, working his 
way into the hearts of the people and into the 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 305 

councils of the Democratic party. He was secre- 
tary of state for Illinois at the age of twenty-seven, 
and in that year was also made a district judge. 
At thirty he was sent as a member of Congress to 
Washington. Reelected twice he was promoted 
in 1847 ^^ ^^^ honor of senatorship, and became 
immediately prominent as chairman of a leading 
committee. During these years he married a 
southern lady and removed to Chicago, with 
whose commercial interests he allied himself 
closely by investing in real estate, the promise 
of which he was quick to see. 

To Chicago and northern Illinois Douglas ren- 
dered a great service by contending for the build- 
ing of the Illinois Central Railroad through the 
upper counties of the state to Chicago as a ter- 
minal. In this measure, whose passage he se- 
cured by making a combination plan with a 
southern railroad so that the proposed bill con- 
templated in the future a trunk line from the 
Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico and thus 
became a national instead of a local measure. 
Senator Douglas showed himself more than a 
state and party politician. There was states- 
manlike genius in a plan thus to unite the 
North and South industrially and socially at a 



3o6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

time when the tendency was to separate interests 
and separate policies. His speech in Congress 
was one of the first to set forth the power of 
the Great Lakes and the place of the Mississippi 
Valley in the national well-being. 

Reelected senator for several successive periods, 
he became through the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 
which he himself drafted, the advocate of " popu- 
lar sovereignty," a phrase which he coined to 
take the place of the less dignified term " squatter 
sovereignty,*' that had previously designated the 
principle that each state had a right to decide 
such questions as slavery for itself. He returned 
to Chicago in 1854, to be met by a mob who de- 
nounced his policy, and immediately threw him- 
self into an active campaign in the hostile counties 
of northern Illinois. When he came back to 
secure his seat in the Senate for another term, 
Douglas had been placed by the course of na- 
tional events in an entirely new position. Bitterly 
resenting the trickery which had made " popular 
sovereignty " a mere name and had given the 
state of Kansas at the Lecompton convention 
into the hands of the pro-slavery men, Douglas 
stood out on the floor of the Senate against his 
party and declared his opposition to the Lecomp- 



Lincoln and Douglas In Chicago 307 

ton constitution. Revolting against his own 
party, he was nevertheless representing the senti- 
ment of Illinois and the Northwest, and he re- 
turned to Chicago in 1858 to an unequalled 
popularity. 

It was four years since Douglas had been in 
Chicago, — since the day when he had been met 
by a storm of abuse and his address had been 
heralded by the lowering of flags to half-mast and 
the tolling of bells as for some public calamity. 
Now an enthusiastic delegation met him at 
Michigan City and escorted him by special train 
to his home. As his train entered Chicago it was 
greeted by the booming of cannon, and every sign 
of public enthusiasm. Crowds filled the streets 
and banners waved from the balconies and 
windows. The whole city was brilliantly deco- 
rated ; bands of music marched the streets ; and 
in a carriage drawn by six horses and surrounded 
by a military escort Senator Douglas, " The De- 
fender of Popular Sovereignty," as the banners 
proclaimed him, drove to the Tremont House, 
receiving everywhere a welcome that proclaimed 
him the idol of his fellow-citizens. 

The Tremont House was the finest hotel in 
the city. The first house of that name had been 



308 The Story of the Great Lakes 

built in 1832. It had been burned, as had its 
immediate successor, and the proprietor had 
erected on the land a fine brick building five 
stories and a half high, containing two hundred 
rooms, whose extravagant cost of seventy thou- 
sand dollars and whose magnificence the business 
men of Chicago had been inclined to ridicule as 
entirely beyond the possible needs of the city at 
its erection, but which they were now beginning 
to regard as an evidence of great foresight on the 
part of its builder. From its balcony Douglas 
delivered on the night of his arrival the first ad- 
dress of the campaign for the senatorship in 
which, by the nomination of the Republicans, 
Abraham Lincoln was to be his opponent. 

While Douglas had been carrying off the 
honors of the Democratic party of Illinois, Lin- 
coln had been rising more slowly to prominence 
in the ranks of the Whig and later of the newly 
organized Republican party. With the events of 
his early life his subsequent career has made 
every one familiar. He had been a practising 
lawyer as well as politician, had been several 
times to the state legislature, and in 1 846 had 
been sent to Congress. Opposing the Kansas- 
Nebraska Act, he had done much to organize the 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 309 

new Republican party in Illinois, and was recog- 
nized as its strongest man. He was now unani- 
mously named as " the first and only choice of the 
Republicans of Illinois for the United States 
Senate." Yet, although known to the Republi- 
cans of the Northwest as a lawyer of ability and 
a political leader, he seemed no match for the 
popular and well-known senator from Washing- 
ton. 

With Lincoln standing behind him within the 
hotel, Douglas made on the evening of the 9th 
of July a long address to th6 thousands of people 
who surged in the street below the balcony. 
This speech was a defence of his Lecompton 
attitude, and a review of his differences with Lin- 
coln's propositions, as expressed in his speech 
accepting the nomination, the famous " house- 
divided-against-itself " declaration. Douglas was 
a short, broad-shouldered, thick-set man, with 
great alertness and animation of manner. A 
traveller from the East who was staying at the 
hotel recorded her impressions of the two 
speakers. Of Douglas, she said that in manner 
he combined force and unusual grace. His head 
was noble, almost Websterian, his voice pleasant, 
and altogether he was " a most effective popular 



3IO The Story of the Great Lakes 

speaker." The next night Lincoln spoke to a 
large and enthusiastic audience from the same 
balcony. Because he was not so well-known the 
writer described him more fully. In person tall 
and awkward, and in manner ungainly, his face 
still had such good humor, generosity, and intel- 
lect beaming from it that it made the eye love to 
linger there until one almost fancied him good- 
looking. As a political speaker she found him 
ready, humorous, and argumentative, with a gift 
at telling anecdotes with inconceivable quaintness 
and effect. 

The two candidates had met many times be- 
fore, and had debated together as early as 1834. 
Lincoln was not underrated by Douglas as a 
weak opponent in the campaign. When Doug- 
las heard of his nomination he had said, " I shall 
have my hands full. He is the strong man of 
his party — full of wit, facts, dates — and the 
best stump speaker, with his droll ways and dry 
jokes, in the West. He is as honest as he is 
shrewd ; and if I beat him, my victory will be 
hardly won." 

Immediately after the Chicago speeches the 
two candidates set out on the tour of Illinois 
which soon became a three months' continuation 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 311 

of joint debates. As a result Douglas went back 
to the Senate, but he went back a weakened man 
to a divided party. Two years later, while he was 
being nominated for the presidency by one wing 
of his party, Lincoln was being nominated for the 
same office by the Republicans at Chicago. 

When it was decided to hold the National 
Republican Convention in that city, the people 
set about providing a building for the occasion. 
At Pittsburg in 1856 a hall for two thousand was 
large enough. At the corner of Lake and Mar- 
ket streets the Republicans erected a huge oblong 
wooden building which would hold ten thousand 
men, and as the event proved it was not large 
enough by a third, and twenty thousand more 
clamored in the streets for admittance. This 
structure was absolutely bare, its walls being 
broken by two rows of windows, and its two 
front corners surmounted by small square towers 
with flagstafFs. Over the door was an arched 
front bearing the words " Republican Wigwam.'' 
It cost seven thousand dollars and its great vir- 
tue was the excellence of its acoustic properties. 

Thousands of men came to the city for the 
convention and the excitement was tremendous. 
During the first two days of the gathering the 



312 The Story of the Great Lakes 

time was given up to framing the platform and 
to other business, and it was not till the third day 
that the four hundred and sixty-five delegates 
proceeded to balloting. The New Yorkers were 
jubilant in their assurance of the success of their 
nominee, Mr. Seward, and had created the same 
impression in many circles. As a last demon- 
stration the Seward men held a great parade on 
the morning of the third day, the i8th of 
May ; but by this act they lost more than they 
gained, for while they were marching about with 
bands the Lincoln men filled up the Wigwam, 
and when the Seward men arrived they had to take 
back seats. 

When the convention was called to order, there 
was not an unoccupied space a foot square in 
the building. The three broad doorways were 
crowded, and outside tens of thousands of men 
thronged the streets. The excitement was tre- 
mendous, and thunders of applause burst forth 
at the names of Seward and Lincoln. When 
the delegates settled down to voting, the result 
of the first ballot was lyj^- for Seward and 102 
for Lincoln, the rest of the votes going to the six 
minor candidates. On the next ballot the states 
abandoned their " favorite sons," turning to one 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 313 

or the other of the two leaders, with the result 
that Seward had 184J and Lincoln 181. Two 
hundred and thirty-three votes were necessary for 
a choice. As the delegates were preparing for 
the third ballot, the chairman of the Illinois Re- 
publican Committee entered the hall with a large 
crayon likeness of " Honest Old Abe," while 
Judge Davis followed, carrying on his shoulders 
a long, moss-covered old rail bearing the legend, 
" Split by Lincoln." The dense crowd went 
wild with enthusiasm. 

On the third ballot Lincoln had 231!, Seward 
180. One vote and a half more were needed, and 
there was a moment of breathless silence until 
the chairman of the Ohio delegation rose and 
announced the change of four votes from Chase 
to Lincoln. For a moment the hall was still, 
and then as every one drew a long breath of 
relief the sound in the Wigwam was like the rush 
of a mighty wind. Then the thunders of ap- 
plause and the shouting broke loose. The man 
on the roof who had been reporting the balloting 
to the crowds without leaned over the skylight 
to find out who had been the man named. One 
of the tellers shouted above the din, " Fire the 
salute ! Abe Lincoln is nominated ! " and outside 



314 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the waiting thousands took up the cry. So loud 
was the uproar that men in the Wigwam could 
hardly hear the sound of the cannon discharged 
on the roof of the building, or the answering 
salute of one hundred guns fired from the roof 
of the Tremont House. Votes were promptly 
changed over until the number for Lincoln was 
three hundred and fifty-four, and then the con- 
vention adjourned. It had been one of the 
memorable conventions of the nation, and had 
been made up of a large number of leading men. 
Sixty of the delegates were later sent by their 
respective states to Congress, and many of the 
members were made governors. A great man 
had been called to lead the nation through a 
great crisis. 

One more memorable scene in the lives of 
these two men took place at the Wigwam, which 
had been rechristened National Hall. To Chi- 
cago Douglas returned after war had been de- 
clared. With rare nobility and greatness he had 
supported President Lincoln and the administra- 
tion in Washington, upholding Lincoln in every 
way that the leader of a great party, who had 
polled at the last election over a million votes, 
could. No leader has ever shown less personal 



Lincoln and Douglas in Chicago 315 

feeling and more true greatness than Mr. Douglas 
in that crisis. He sank the partisan in the patriot 
and turned all his energies towards the saving of 
the Union. With Lincoln's approval and grati- 
tude he left Washington to arouse the sentiment 
of loyalty and Unionism in the critical North- 
west, and made in April, 1861, a series of ad- 
dresses along his homeward route, closing with 
a great plea in the Capitol at Springfield. One 
who had never admired him, listening now to 
this speech for the support of the government 
and the defence of the Union, said that he did 
not think it was possible for a human being to 
produce a more prodigious effect with spoken 
words. Southern as well as northern Illinois 
was ready after this for the conflict. 

As he entered Chicago Douglas was met with 
a remarkable demonstration. He had come home 
many times, sometimes for honor and some- 
times for abuse, but never to meet the united 
regard and support of men of all parties and all 
beliefs. In the Wigwam he made a final ad- 
dress, setting forth to his hearers the situation, 
and announcing that the critical time was come. 
" The conspiracy is now known. . . . There 
are only two sides to the question. Every man 



21 6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

must be for the United States or against it." 
For the first time he drew the sharp distinction 
setting the two sides in striking contrast, and 
calHng the people of Ilhnois to loyalty. The 
gentle side of his personality made him foresee 
with dread the horrors of war, and he besought 
the people to remember that they were a Chris- 
tian nation and as such they must prosecute the 
war, saving as far as possible the innocent, the 
women and children, from suffering. 

The Chicago speech was published all over 
the country, and Douglas supporters recognized 
that their leader had become the first of the 
great company of " War Democrats," of which 
General Logan and other distinguished men 
were to be loyal members. In a few days he 
was taken ill and died at the Tremont House. 
His last words were a message to his sons to 
" obey the laws and support the Constitution 
of the United States." Chicago, Illinois, and 
the nation mourned him as a true patriot. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

THE GREAT LAKES IN THE CIVIL WAR 

AS the northern frontier of the United 
States the Great Lakes, although at some 
distance from the decisive battles of the 
Civil War, were the scene of strong Confederate 
activity, especially in the last year of the struggle. 
In April, 1864, Jefferson Davis sent three men 
to Canada as " Special Commissioners of the 
Confederate Government." They established 
quarters at Montreal and Toronto, and prepared 
themselves according to their written and verbal 
instructions to use in any way possible the feeling 
of hostility to the administration, which existed 
in the Northwestern states, and to organize this 
sentiment into definite opposition to the further 
prosecution of the war. That was where they 
began. The most daring Confederate leaders in 
Canada and the South had dreams of a North- 
western Confederacy which should come into 
being after a general uprising and should be 

317 



jiS The Story of the Great Lakes 

matched by the Southern Confederacy and an 
Eastern Union. There were at this time prob- 
ably one hundred escaped Confederate prisoners 
in Canada, as well as many Southern men and 
Confederate sympathizers who had come there 
when, for some reason, they were better able to 
serve their cause at this distance. 

Talk with Northern men who visited Canada 
disclosed to the commissioners the fact that there 
was in all the lake states a large body of dis- 
affected men who did not support the adminis- 
tration. These were divided into two classes : 
first, the members of secret societies of a political 
and semi-military nature, of which the " Sons of 
Liberty " was the leading organization ; and 
secondly, a large number who were actuated 
mainly by a general weariness and dissatisfaction 
with the war. Especially in Ohio, Indiana, and 
Illinois the " Sons of Liberty " had great strength. 
It is difficult to find out the exact figures. In 
the three states it is thought they may have had 
one hundred and seventy -five thousand members. 
Chicago had a strong chapter of two thousand 
men, which was constantly adding to its numbers. 
The latter class, of those who were generally dis- 
affected with the situation, was strengthened by 



The Great Lakes in the Civil War 319 

Mr. Lincoln's call in July of 1864 for five hundred 
thousand more men for the army. Indeed, it was 
along this line that the secret societies did most 
harm. When the time for definite action came, 
these men were not ready to strike a blow against 
the Union ; but the sentiment of the bodies was 
against volunteering, and by reducing the num- 
bers of ready volunteers they made drafting, with 
its attendant discontent, necessary in these last 
years, after these same states had sent out so 
many regiments of their best sons to serve gal- 
lantly on the field. 

The first project of the Confederates on the 
Canadian frontier was to liberate all Confederate 
prisoners in the North, and in this purpose their 
hopes centred in Chicago, for here there was a 
great prison with thousands of men in confine- 
ment. Camp Douglas had been laid out in the 
summer of 186 1 as a camp for miHtary instruc- 
tion. It was located on land belonging to the 
Douglas estate, just north of the grounds of the 
first Chicago University. In this region, where 
stands to-day the Douglas monument, no streets 
were then laid out, but the whole was open 
prairie, save for the little University building 
erected four years before, and one solitary resi- 



320 The Story of the Great Lakes 

dence. The camp was first used as a military 
station, but in February, 1862, after the battle of 
Fort Donelson, it was hastily prepared for the 
reception of prisoners and eight or nine thou- 
sand Confederates were placed there. Temporary 
quarters were erected to hold them, but the 
barracks became so crowded that the United 
States regiments were obliged to encamp in tents 
on the prairie. During this year Camp Douglas 
served as military prison for seventeen thousand 
Confederate prisoners and furnished barracks as 
well for eight thousand paroled Confederate 
troops. In 1863 it was much improved by a 
thorough rebuilding which followed a season of 
inclement weather, when the unsanitary and 
crowded conditions made the men, already weak- 
ened by exposure and army life, a prey to all 
kinds of disease. It was in the fall of this year 
that many dramatic escapes were made, the pris- 
oners taking up the floor of their barracks and 
digging gradually at night and during the absences 
of the guards a long tunnel large enough for one 
man to crawl through to the open land beyond 
the camp fence. On a dark night eight or ten 
men would make their way out, watching from 
the outer end of the tunnel to escape between the 



The Great Lakes in the Civil War 321 

rounds of the sentinel. During November some 
seventy prisoners made their escape through a 
tunnel over fifty feet long, of whom fifty were 
afterwards recaptured. The next year the pris- 
oners' barracks were raised four feet above the 
ground to prevent such escapes. 

It was no wonder that the thoughts of the 
Canadian Commissioners turned to this prison. 
During the year 1864, seventy-five hundred men 
came to join the fivQ thousand already there, and 
in spite of the large death-rate that summer from 
smallpox and other contagious diseases, this was a 
body of men who, if liberated, could do great 
things in the Northwest. 

All summer the leaders of the movement tried 
to get their Northern sympathizers to move, but 
the " Sons of Liberty " set as the first possible 
time for action the 29th of August, the date of 
the meeting of the National Democratic Conven- 
tion in Chicago. At this time, and under the 
guise of politics, large numbers of men could be 
introduced into the city without suspicion and 
it was hoped that the sentiment of the convention 
would be one of strong disaffection to further 
prosecution of the war. Captain Hines, one of 
the leading agents of the Confederacy, and sixty 



322 The Story of the Great Lakes 

picked men were ready to head the movement ; 
arms had been brought into the city, and the 
prisoners had been notified to be ready ; but the 
rank and file of the prospective army did not 
materialize. The government had got wind of 
the project and had sent extra troops to the city. 
These amounted to only a thousand men, but the 
convention was not so rabid in its opposition as 
had been hoped, and when it came to the moment 
the " Sons of Liberty " were not ready to strike 
the decisive blow, and the leaders were soon con- 
vinced that the time was not ripe. They could 
not count on a sufficiently large number of North- 
western men for their support, and without them 
they could do nothing. 

The next step in the programme of the disap- 
pointed Commissioners was to capture the war 
steamer Michigan^ the only armed vessel on 
the lakes, which was now at Sandusky, and to 
release the Confederate prisoners on Johnson's 
Island within that inlet. The Camp Douglas 
scheme had been to march southward through 
Illinois to the support of the Southern army. 
The present plan was to go by steamer from 
Sandusky to Cleveland, capture that city, and 
proceed through Ohio to Virginia. The plot 



The Great Lakes in the Civil War ^'^3 

was worked out to its last detail. Every signal 
was arranged. There were conspirators in the 
city and on the island, and even on the gun- 
boat itself. But the plan was disclosed by a spy 
to the lieutenant-colonel at Detroit, who tele- 
graphed an instant warning to the commander of 
the Michigan^ and Cole, the leader in this part of 
the plan, was taken. Mr. Beall, who was to bring 
men from Canada, received no word of this mis- 
adventure, but proceeded to execute his share of 
the scheme. To disarm suspicion the first of his 
party, a Mr. Burley, took passage on the steamer 
Philo Parsons^ a merchant vessel plying be- 
tween Detroit and Sandusky. Mr. Beall and two 
others embarked at Sandwich on the Canadian 
side of the river, and sixteen men came on at 
Amherstburg. This last party embarked in worn 
and ragged garments, passing as tramps who had 
gone to Canada to better their fortunes, but with- 
out success. Their only baggage was one great 
old-fashioned trunk tied with ropes. After the 
steamer left Kelley's Island, outside Sandusky 
Bay, Beall announced to the mate in a loud 
voice that he hereby took possession of the boat 
in the name of the Confederate States. As he 
spoke his followers opened the trunk and pulled 



324 The Story of the Great Lakes 

out a formidable array of revolvers and hatchets 
which they brandished about. The crew and pas- 
sengers had no choice but to surrender. As the 
boat needed fuel Beall had it put about and headed 
for Middle Bass Island, ten miles from the Ohio 
shore and about the same distance from Johnson's 
Island. Here the passengers were set on shore 
and another steamer, the Island ^een, was 
boarded as she came up to make her usual landing, 
and taken possession of with much uproar and 
some shooting. Her passengers were also landed 
after a time of suspense on their part, and she was 
towed out into the lake, scuttled, and set adrift 
to sink where she might. 

Beall again headed the Philo Parsons for 
Sandusky Bay and the gunboat Michigan, but 
when he reached the inlet there was no sign of 
the signal lights and rockets which were to have 
guided him. It was bright moonlight, and the 
conspirators could see the lights on the gunboat, 
and even the outlines of her dark hulk, but all 
was quiet and peaceful. Then seventeen of 
Beall's men declared that they would go no 
farther. No one of the expected signals had 
been shown ; Cole had evidently failed, and they 
did not mean to rush blindly into battle with a 



The Great Lakes in the Civil War 325 

gunboat already warned of their approach. The 
steamer was brought to a stop and Beall and his 
assistant, Burley, urged the men on, but in vain. 
The seventeen men drew up and signed a formal 
protest, in which they stated that they as a crew 
would here express their admiration of John Beall, 
both as captain and military leader, but being con- 
vinced that the enemy was already apprised of 
their approach and so well prepared that their 
attack could not possibly succeed, and having al- 
ready captured two boats, they declined to prose- 
cute the enterprise further. Beall and his two 
supporters had no alternative but to head about 
for the Detroit River. He landed several pris- 
oners on an island in the river, among them the 
captain of the Island ^een, and then went 
on to Sandwich on the Canadian shorfe. He and 
his men removed everything of value from the 
Philo Parsons, bored holes in her keel and 
sides, and left her to sink, while they made their 
escape into the interior. 

This bold attempt caused great excitement on 
the northern borders of the United States and in 
Canada. The British government redoubled its 
watchfulness, and the United States sent detec- 
tives across the lakes to keep a close lookout on 



326 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the Canadian ports. So successful was this care 
that the next expedition planned by Beall within 
a few weeks failed utterly. He was to start with 
a vessel from Canada, capture the American 
steamers in Buffalo harbor, take the city if pos- 
sible, and then proceed to Cleveland and to the 
prisoners at Johnson's Island. The Confederates 
were so closely watched that they could not even 
get arms or supplies on the boat. 

September had seen these two attempts on the 
lakes. The next step was the famous St. Al- 
bans raid, when Confederates descended from Can- 
ada into Vermont, and in a half hour tried to 
fire the town, robbed the banks, shot at the citi- 
zens, and were gone again, leaving consternation 
in their wake. The whole frontier was aroused 
by this time. The citizens of the lakes became 
alarmed for their business and commerce, fearing 
that such attempts would paralyze trade. The 
convention of 18 17 with Great Britain had lim- 
ited the naval force on the lakes of each of the 
two nations to three armed vessels, neither fleet 
to be increased without six months* notice to 
the other power. On October 24, four days 
after the St. Albans raid, the British were noti- 
fied that the United States would now deem 



The Great Lakes in the Civil War 327 

themselves at liberty to increase the armament 
within six months if in their judgment the condi- 
tion of affairs should require it. Congress in De- 
cember authorized the construction of six revenue 
cutters on the lakes, but the war was fortunately 
drawing to a close and no further action was taken. 
The Canadian officials made up their minds 
that there should be no more open raids to cast 
reproach on the neutrality of their government, 
but the Confederates were becoming more des- 
perate as the end of the struggle drew near. 
They had not given up their hopes in Chicago, 
but now set the night of election day, Novem- 
ber 8, for an attempt on Camp Douglas. The plan 
of the leaders, as they afterwards confessed, 
was to attack Camp Douglas, releasing the pris- 
oners, to seize the polls, and stuff the boxes until 
the city, county, and state were for McLellan, 
the Democratic candidate, and finally to " utterly 
sack the city, burning and destroying every de- 
scription of property, except what they could 
appropriate for their own use and that of their 
Southern brethren — to lay the city waste and 
carry off* its money and stores to Jefferson 
Davis's dominions." Colonel Sweet, command- 
ing at Chicago, was warned of this plan by 



328 The Story of the Great Lakes 

United States detectives so early that he was able 
to break up the conspiracy without open blood- 
shed. When, on November 6, the city began to 
fill up with suspicious characters, especially the 
leaders of the August gathering, and it became 
evident that the Confederate sympathizers would 
soon outnumber the small garrison at Camp 
Douglas, Colonel Sweet caused the arrest of 
Colonel St. Leger Grenfell and fourteen other 
Confederate officers, and also the heads of the 
"Sons of Liberty." This completely broke up 
the conspiracy. 

Two more attempts were made by the Confed- 
erates from Canada, one to burn New York City, 
and the other to wreck trains on the lake roads. 
The Confederate Commissioner, Thompson, re- 
ceived word in December that seven Southern 
generals were to be moved from Johnson's Island 
to Fort Lafayette, New York. He detailed 
Beall and ten others to take the train and release 
them. They were to stop the train at a lonely 
place between Sandusky and Buffalo by put- 
ting rails across the track, and to secure the engi- 
neer and conductor. While Beall and a few men 
went to secure the money in the express safe of 
the train, others were to arm the generals and 



The Great Lakes in the Civil War 329 

intimidate the passengers. The coaches were to 
be detached, the engine derailed, and then the 
Confederates were to take such money as they 
would need, get into sleighs, and scatter over 
Ohio and Pennsylvania, while the leaders drove 
to Buffalo and caught the train to Canada. The 
detectives discovered their plans, and Beall and 
his companion were arrested while they were asleep 
in an eating-room near the place of the proposed 
attack. When the others failed to find their 
leader, they hastened to escape to Canada. 

Beall was tried for this and other similar deeds, 
and for his capture of the Philo Parsons and the 
Island ^een^ and sentenced to be hanged for his 
conduct as a spy and for carrying on irregular 
and guerilla warfare against the United States. 
The Camp Douglas leaders were also tried by 
military courts. St. Leger Grenfell was sentenced 
to death, but this was commuted to imprisonment 
for life in Florida, from which he escaped three 
years later. The other leaders received sentences 
of imprisonment for terms of two, three, and five 
years. Camp Douglas had in 1865 nearly twelve 
thousand men in its barracks, but at the close of 
the war these were gradually sent to their homes, 
the property was sold, and the buildings torn down. 



CHAPTER XXV 

THREE GREAT INDUSTRIES OF THE LAKES 

NO part of the story of the Great Lakes is 
more significant than the tale of the 
building up of the large enterprises 
that have made that region one of the leading 
centres of production and consumption in the 
United States and the world. The heroes of 
exploration and of adventure were the forerun- 
ners of commerce, and the founders of cities 
were the leaders of industry. Two of the three 
great industries of the early days have persisted 
to the present time ; all three of them have 
contributed largely to exploration and occu- 
pation and deserve to be treated somewhat in 
detail. 

Washington Irving has well said that two lead- 
ing objects of commercial gain have given birth to 
wide and daring enterprise in the early history 
of America. The precious metals led the Span- 

330 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 331 

iard to Mexico and Peru, while, as he puts it, 
the " adroit and buoyant Frenchman " and the 
" cool and calculating Briton " pursued the " less 
splendid, but no less lucrative traffic in the 
rich peltries of the north." The pioneer fur 
traders were followed only after many, many 
years, by what Irving has characterized as "the 
slow and pausing steps of agriculture." 

Apart from the land which agriculture might 
in times of settled peace make profitable, the 
white man found three great natural sources of 
wealth. These were animals bearing fur of great 
value, enormous deposits of copper and iron, 
and primeval forests filled with trees suited to 
the uses of civilized man. Profits from these 
financed many an enterprise, from the earliest 
voyages and the building of the Griffon to the 
days of the railroad and the " Soo " Canal. For 
two centuries, from 1634 to 1834, the fur trade 
was the leading interest and source of profit of 
the Great Lakes. 

During Champlain's governorship the French, 
through Nicolet, first opened an active system 
of trade and barter with the Indians of the lakes, 
and the history of French control thereafter is 
the history of the fur trade. It paid the bills 



22'2. The Story of the Great Lakes 

of many of the voyages we have chronicled. In 
1660 Radisson and Groseillers returned to Que- 
bec from their Lake Superior voyage with sixty 
canoes loaded with furs valued at two hundred 
thousand pounds, in return for which they had 
distributed among the Indians kettles, graters, 
awls, needles, tin looking-glasses, ivory combs, 
and knives. Even the official expedition of 
Saint Lusson to take possession of the North- 
west for France was to be paid for by gifts to 
the Indians and return offerings of fur. 

The fur trade of the Great Lakes supported 
not only those who took up their dwelling on 
these shores, but the struggling settlements of 
Canada as well. It kept up home interest in 
the support of these colonies by the rich profit 
that it brought across the seas. In 1703 La 
Hontan wrote that Canada subsisted only on 
the trade of skins and furs. The profits and 
the fascination of this pursuit robbed Canada 
of its young men while it supplied it with money. 
An official reported, in 1680, that eight hundred 
men out of a population of ten thousand had 
vanished from sight into the wilderness, and 
that there was not a family of any condition or 
quality that had not children, brothers, uncles, or 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes ^^3 

nephews among the traders. There came to be 
in the woods a distinct class of men known as 
coureurs de bois, or rangers of the forest, who had 
escaped from the restraints of civiHzed life and 
reported themselves only once or twice a year at 
the trading posts. 

The government tried to stem the rush 
of young men into the wilderness by requiring 
licenses for trading with the Indians and limit- 
ing the number to seventy-five a year ; but the 
country was too large and remote and the gov- 
ernment too feeble to carry out any such policy. 
In the end the rulers turned their attention 
instead to providing fortified trading posts for 
these wanderers, first to afford defence against 
the Indians, and more especially to concentrate 
and monopolize the trade, protecting it from the 
rival Englishmen. These forts also made a claim 
of possession in the regions which they com- 
manded. Thus Mackinac, Detroit, Niagara, 
Green Bay, Oswego, and a dozen minor posts 
sprang up. 

Travellers of the eighteenth century were likely 
to meet on any one of the lakes fleets of fifty or 
sixty canoes, heavily laden with beaver, otter, 
mink, and marten skins, and paddled by Indians 



334 The Story of the Great Lakes 

in their paint and feathers, or by hardly less 
picturesque coureurs de bois in their blanket coats, 
leathern moccasins and leggings, and scarlet sash 
and cap. These men were no mere traders whose 
knowledge was limited to prices and profits. 
They were experts not only in the science of the 
woods but also in the arts of diplomacy. The 
success of the trade depended on the mainten- 
ance of peace between the various Indian tribes 
and groups of tribes ; and the life of the individ- 
ual trader, as well as his earnings, depended on 
his own adaptability. There came in time to be 
leaders to whom the most difficult negotiations 
with the Indians were left. Daniel de Greyselon 
Du Luth, a prince among coureurs de bois, was 
the chief hero of the early French period in the 
upper country. In the summer of 1679 ^^ 
made a tour of Minnesota, planting with all 
ceremony the arms of France in the leading 
Indian villages, many of which he was the first 
Frenchman to visit. At the end of the summer 
he held on the shores of Lake Superior, near 
the site of the present city of Duluth, a great 
Indian council of chiefs from all these villages, 
and negotiated a treaty of peace. The city that 
bears his name may well be proud of the fact 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 335 

that after ten years among the Indians he entered 
a written protest, still preserved in the archives 
of Canada, with his disapproval of the sale of 
whiskey and brandy to the natives. These lead- 
ers were very important to the success of the ad- 
ministration in Canada and were relied on and 
treated with all respect. Their names were even 
sent across the ocean, as we see in the laconic but 
warm commendation of Du Luth sent by the 
Governor of Canada in his colonial report of 
17 10: "Captain Du Luth died this winter; he 
was a very honest man." 

After the fall of New France, a time of chaos 
followed in the wilderness. With the restraint 
of the strictly enforced code of French rule 
removed, with a host of French traders in the 
woods who did not yield to British control, and 
with an opportunity for rivalry and ill-feeling 
between every two traders, Indians as well as 
white men became demoralized and the profits 
decreased greatly. Then twenty-three merchants 
of Montreal formed the Northwest Fur Company 
(1783) and took into their employ two thousand 
French and other fur traders. They traded with 
the Indians of the Northwest, with Mackinac as 
a centre. A rival company soon started compe- 



336 The Story of the Great Lakes 

tition in the southern region of Wisconsin, Illi- 
nois, and the Mississippi Valley. A careful 
statement concerning the British trade was sent to 
the authorities in Canada in 1790, when the pos- 
sible future evacuation of the southern shores 
of the lakes was beginning to be considered. 
By this estimate the average produce of furs and 
skins amounted for ten years to two hundred 
thousand pounds a year. How this was dis- 
tributed among the various lake posts is shown 
in the following table : — 

Statement concerning Trade at Detroit and Other Posts 

Pounds 
The whole Country & Posts below Montreal 30,000 

The Grand River, the North Side of the Lakes 

Ontario, Huron, & Superior 30,000 

In the Country generally called the North 

West 40,000 

In the Countries to the Southward of the 

Lakes, the Trade of which is principally 

brought to the posts of Detroit and Mich- 

illimackinac, there being very little Indian 

Trade at Niagara 100,000 

As above ^200,000 

Dividing this general estimate into smaller dis- 
tricts, the estimate was as follows : — 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 337 

In the District of the Garrison of Detroit Packs 
The Fort of Detroit, Sagana & the South 

Side of Lake Huron 1000 

Miamis & Wabash Country 2000 

Sandusky 400 





Say 


3400 


packs of 


Furrs estimated at 1 2^ each is 






;^40,8oo 


In the District of Michillimackinac : 








On Lake Michigan 




Packs 




The Grand River 




100 




St. Josephs 




300 




Checago 




100 




Milwaki 




120 




La Bay or Green Bay, including the 


upper 






ports of the Mississippi, the South Side 






of Lake Superior 




300 




The Illinois Country 




600 






Say 


3220 


packs of 


Furrs estimated at £^20 each 






^60,400 



Total of the two Districts 



^101,200 



This estimate was sent to the colonial office to 
show that if the lake posts were ceded to America, 
at least half if not seven-tenths of the Indian 
trade would be lost. 

The Americans were not ignorant of this great 
opportunity for trade. When the lake posts 



22^ The Story of the Great Lakes 

were evacuated by the British in 1796, they 
began to take a hand in the competition. The 
United States government sent out agents, and 
John Jacob Astor found a field for his business 
enterprise. In 1809 he organized the American 
Fur Company, and two years later he bought out 
the Mackinaw Company and the Northwest 
Company south of the boundary line. His 
plan to unite the Pacific and the Great Lakes 
failed for the time being, and the War of 18 12 
interfered with his schemes ; but his organization 
of the lake trade did its work in turning the 
stream of profits southward of the border and 
Americanizing Lake Superior. 

The settlements built up by the fur trade were 
unique and amazing when we consider their isola- 
tion in the midst of the wilderness. With Mack- 
inac under French rule we are somewhat familiar, 
having visited it with La Salle and Saint Lusson. 
At Fort William, at the western end of Lake Su- 
perior, the British merchants built an establishment 
that reminds one of the feudal castles of the Old 
World. In 1805 the Canadian companies awoke 
to the fact that the old Grand Portage, the former 
gateway of the North, was on territory claimed 
by the American government. They promptly 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 339 

demolished their old fort there, and built Fort 
William, forty-five miles north of the portage. 
There they established a village surrounded by a 
high palisade, within which stood a big central 
building, a counting-house, a doctor's residence, 
stores for merchandise and depots for furs, work- 
shops for mechanics, — carpenters, coopers, 
blacksmiths, tinsmiths, and canoe builders, — 
boarding-houses for traders, a powder-house and 
guard-house, and not the least necessary of the 
many buildings, a jail. Outside the palisade was a 
long wharf, a ship-building yard, a cemetery, and a 
considerable line of log houses and Indian wigwams. 
The great feature of the settlement, however, 
was the central building. This wooden edifice 
stood in the middle of a spacious square and had 
a long balcony, five feet from the ground. In 
the centre, flanked by rows of apartments, was a 
great dining hall, sixty feet long by thirty wide, 
where two hundred agents, partners, clerks, inter- 
preters, guides, and visitors could dine. Across 
the upper end of the hall was stretched a very 
large map of the Indian country, with all the 
Northwest Company's posts and routes from the 
Great Lakes to Hudson Bay and the Pacific, — 
probably the only accurate map of that region 



340 The Story of the Great Lakes 

on the continent, save for its smaller copies in 
the factories themselves. Along the sides of the 
room were portraits of various proprietors of the 
company, a bust of Simon McTavish, a pioneer 
member of the company and long its head, a 
full-length portrait of Nelson, and a painting of 
the battle of the Nile. 

To this post came every spring from Montreal 
two of the directors of the company, with a 
retinue of cooks, bakers, clerks, and attendants, 
and in the great hall from the last of May to the 
end of August there was always high carnival of 
feasting and merriment. In this room, too, were 
held the parliaments of the fur trade, when with 
all solemnity the Scottish chiefs regulated the 
affairs of the company and shrewdly made their 
bargains and estimated their earnings. About 
them gathered a host of traders, coming every 
day out of the bleak wilderness to enjoy the good 
cheer of this metropolis of the Northwest and 
spend their hard-earned gains in the short sum- 
mer holiday ; and with these came a legion of 
half-breeds, Indians, and hangers-on. It was 
a picturesque and motley throng. Ross Cox, 
visiting there in 1817, found natives of every 
part of the British Isles, of France, Germany, 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 341 

Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Holland, and Switzer- 
land, and, in the capacity of servants, of Africa, 
the Sandwich Islands, and Bengal. "In their fea- 
tures," he says, " all shades of the human species, — 
in their dress, all the varied hues of the rainbow." 
If the paddle and moccasin of the fur trader 
had been the pathfinder for the lake region, the 
axe of the lumberman and the pick of the miner 
who followed them opened up and cleared the 
wilderness. The fur trader had discovered and 
explored the wilderness. He was driven out by 
the lumberman and miner, who spoiled his field 
with such speed that in a decade or two fur 
trading as a leading industry was banished to 
more distant regions. The newcomers made a 
place for their successors, the pioneer farmers and 
settlers, by clearing and preparing the country. 
Extensive lumbering and mining operations 
came only with the Americans. For two hun- 
dred years the French and English tried to keep 
the western part of the lake region a wilderness 
and preserve for hunting. The French did it by 
instinct, for they preferred the wild, free life it 
offered them ; the English did it by policy. In 
the Parliament of Great Britain leading legislators 
argued for the restriction of immigration, so that 



34^ The Story of the Great Lakes 

the hunting-grounds should not be disturbed. 
By a royal proclamation of 1763 the valley of the 
Ohio and the country about the Great Lakes was 
declared closed to settlement or purchase of land 
without special leave or license. A forest pre- 
serve was created, and the northwest country was 
designated by the English " the habitation of 
bears and beavers." Only with the coming of 
the Americans was the lake region developed, 
and the first signs of the approaching civilization 
were the cutting down of forests and the mining 
of copper and iron deposits. 

Two great divisions are recognized in the forest 
distribution of the United States, — the Atlantic 
and the Pacific. These are separated by the 
great interior plains and prairies of the conti- 
nent. The line of cleavage between timber land 
and prairie is nowhere so defined that it does not 
have inlets of prairie land in the forest region, 
and stretches of wooded land in the plain, but 
the Mississippi River is in general the western 
boundary of the Atlantic forest area, and the 
states of the Great Lakes are all included in 
this section. Within this eastern forest there 
are several belts of different kinds of woods. 
Two of these are in the lake states. The north- 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 343 

ern belt, largely of white pine mixed with red or 
Norway pine, stretches from New England across 
New York State and northern Pennsylvania to 
Wisconsin and the eastern part of Minnesota, 
and is broken only by Lake Erie. This tract 
has been the chief source of supply for the 
United States. South of this white pine belt 
runs a central hardwood section, where are par- 
ticularly valuable forests of hickory, maple, oak, 
and walnut. This section extends from Niagara 
eastward into New York, and westward across 
the northern parts of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. 
As it was in the natural line of migration both 
from the rivers of the south and the lakes of the 
north, this central belt was cut long before the 
pine sections were touched. It fell out in this 
way, therefore, that for three-quarters of a cen- 
tury these states have been in the main agricul- 
tural, rather than forest lands. 

Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota have 
had a long history of lumber prosperity. The 
first railroads of Michigan were welcomed by the 
settlers as a means of transporting lumber from 
the logging-camps and sawmills that were spring- 
ing up all through the central part of the state. 
The northern industry was taken care of by the 



344 The. Story of the Great Lakes 

lake vessels, which took the lumber from the ports 
on the shore through the straits of Mackinac. 
Lake Superior, which had long been a centre for 
the shifting fur trade, was settled permanently for 
the first time by the men who were brought by 
lumber interests. The Mackinac region, the 
Saginaw and St. Croix rivers, and many smaller 
streams became the scenes during the winter 
months of a busy and picturesque activity, and 
have been associated ever since in fact and fiction 
with the romance as well as the profit of the lum- 
ber industry. As Rochester in the East had be- 
gun with a sawmill, so Duluth and Superior in 
the West came into being as supply stations for 
the rivermen, and their prosperity depended in 
1870 so largely on the lumber traffic that the 
contest over the railroads, which each place wanted 
on its side of the state line, was determined by 
the interests and preferences of the lumber kings. 
No accurate record of the entire amount of 
lumber produced was made in the first decades 
of the industry, but in 1890 Michigan, Wiscon- 
sin, and Minnesota were cutting more than one- 
third of all the lumber supply of the United 
States, and to this Michigan contributed one- 
half the amount credited to the three states, and 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 345 

one-fifth of the whole product of the country. 
Four-fifths of Michigan was then reported to be 
forested, — a record leading that of any other state. 

As early as 1850 the Michigan lumber busi- 
ness was so large as to attract attention through- 
out commercial centres of the country, and it 
grew with the amazing rapidity of all western 
development. In 1854 there were in the state 
sixty-one sawmills with an output of 108 million 
feet; in 1872 there were fifteen hundred saw- 
mills, to say nothing of all the other activities 
incident on lumbering, such as making shingles 
and planing. By 1881 the amount had jumped 
to nearly forty million feet, and it was calculated 
that the output of Michigan mills that year would 
have loaded a train of cars nearly twenty-five hun- 
dred miles long. 

These figures have come from the western 
states, but here as everywhere else the cities and 
states of the lakes show their interdependence. 
Buffalo, at the eastern extremity of Lake Erie, 
becomes one of the leading lumber markets of the 
world by reason of the immense shipments that 
come to it from the upper lakes. In 1907 Buffalo 
had one hundred and thirty-two lumber firms, and 
an annual output from her yards of over two 



346 The Story of the Great Lakes 

hundred million feet of pine and over one hun- 
dred and fifty million feet of hardwood. This 
product was made up of the best species of pines, 
sought for by all dealers, and the hardwood em- 
braced every known variety of American trees. 

It is beginning to be evident that this pace 
cannot be kept up without exhausting the forests. 
In 1903 the cut from the three northern states 
was not fifty million feet, a smaller cut than any 
year since 1878 and hardly more than half that 
of 1890. To the danger involved in reckless 
cutting without reforesting our people and legis- 
lators have become aroused, and these states are 
matching their past leadership in output by a 
corresponding activity in protecting their forest 
areas. Minnesota led in having an effective 
system of fire-wardens, and each state is creating 
forestry commissions and buying up preserves. 
In thus rescuing from destruction our forests no 
one can be too prompt or too energetic. Less 
than a hundred years of occupation of the lake 
region must not wipe out this industry or destroy 
the natural beauty and resources of the country. 
The fur trade had to go before the advance of 
civilization ; the lumber industry must not be 
allowed to follow in its wake. 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 347 

The fur trade was at its height in 1820 and 
was seriously on the wane by 1835 ; ^^^ lumber 
industry was of a size to be reckoned with by 
1 830 ; in the next decade, between 1 840 and 1 850, 
the mineral industry came into existence. The 
earliest explorers had known of the presence in 
the Lake Superior region of large deposits of 
virgin copper. References are made to these de- 
posits in the Jesuit " Relations." The first at- 
tempt at mining was made in 1770 by Alexander 
Henry, the trader at Mackinac, after the Indian 
wars were over, but he was not successful. 

With the coming of the Americans, copper 
mining began in earnest. Indeed, it was said by 
a friend, who told the story twenty years after the 
conversation, that Benjamin Franklin told him 
that when he was drawing the treaty of peace in 
Paris he had access to the journals and charts of a 
corps of French engineers who had been explor- 
ing Lake Superior, and that he drew the line 
through Lake Superior to include the best and 
largest supply of copper in the American posses- 
sions. " The time will come," said Franklin, 
" when drawing that line will be considered the 
greatest service I ever rendered my country." 

Copper and silver were the minerals whose 



348 The Story of the Great Lakes 

discovery created the most enthusiasm, and 
several companies were formed for their mining 
in the thirties and forties after the expedition of 
Governor Cass. Of these at the time of the 
Civil War only two were paying dividends. In 
1865 the Calumet and Hecla mines were started 
and began to develop that part of the rich upper 
peninsula of Michigan known as Keweenaw Point. 
From that time the mines have sent out yearly 
thousands of tons, and millions of dollars are 
realized every year from them. Until 1 880, when 
copper was found in Montana and Arizona, 
Michigan was the only source of supply in the 
United States, and sent out five-sixths of the 
nation's whole product. Since that time her out- 
put has trebled, but owing to the great increase of 
mining in the West this tremendous tonnage of 
copper is to-day only one-fourth of the total, al- 
though still a most important factor in the con- 
tribution of the lake region to the wealth of the 
country. 

The presence of iron ore in the Lake Superior 
country was hardly suspected until after 1840. 
All companies were formed to mine copper, silver, 
or gold. The state geologist made no mention 
of iron in his first report in 1840, but in Septem- 




u 

Qh 
Oh 

o 

oi 
O 



0- 

< 

>- 

-1 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 349 

ber, 1844, a party of government surveyors run- 
ning the lines of a township twelve miles west of 
Marquette, noticed the deflection of their compass 
needle. The party was under the leadership of 
Mr. Burt, the inventor of the solar compass, and 
he was overjoyed to find his instrument working 
according to his predictions. The deflection was 
so great that he summoned his party and sent 
them out in all directions to search for the iron 
which he was convinced must exist in large quan- 
tities in the near vicinity. Every one of them re- 
turned in a short time with specimens of the ore. 
Thus was discovered the first of the famous ranges 
that to-day produce one-third of all the iron mined 
in the United States. 

•At the time of the discovery of iron deposits 
there were not over fifty people in Marquette 
County. Expeditions were fitted out in each 
succeeding year, and companies began to operate 
the mines. They worked against great natural 
obstacles in the remote wilderness. It is hard 
for us to realize how far out of the world this 
country seemed at that time. When Michigan 
was admitted as a state in 1837, the reception 
of the upper peninsula in compensation for a 
cession to Ohio of the well-known Toledo tract 



3 50 The Story of the Great Lakes 

was regarded with the greatest dissatisfaction. 
The " State Gazetteer " of that year spoke of 
the new possession as a wild tract of twenty 
thousand miles of howling wilderness, while one 
of the political songs of the time told with scorn 
how the people were being coerced into trading 
away the southern land for " that poor frozen 
land of Michigan/' Within twenty years that 
sentiment underwent a swift and radical change. 
The first companies struggled along in the 
wilderness carrying their ore to a forge on the 
Carp River, bringing it first by Indian trail and 
then by wagon road twelve miles down to the 
waterside, where it was loaded on sailing vessels 
by being put on wheelbarrows and rolled up a 
steep plank. In 1852 the Marquette Iron Com- 
pany shipped six barrels by this laborious method 
to Cleveland, which was the first ever received 
from Lake Superior. The first considerable 
shipment was one of five thousand tons three 
years later. Then the great panic of 1857 
stopped people for the time being from ventur- 
ing their money in new and unproved enter- 
prises ; but the Civil War created a great demand 
for iron, and from that time the industry has 
flourished. 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 351 

When transportation facilities were needed, the 
" Soo" Canal was built, and at that very time Mr. 
Heman B. Ely began an agitation for the build- 
ing of a railroad in this region. Owing to his 
influence and under his direction the Iron Moun- 
tain Road was built from Marquette to the shore 
of Lake Superior, the first road in the whole 
northern country. Mr. Ely was well known in 
other lake states, as well as being one of the 
leading pioneers in the north. He had built 
the first telegraph lines from Buffalo to Detroit 
and from Cleveland to Pittsburg, had been presi- 
dent of a railroad company at Cleveland whose 
holdings were the foundation of the Lake Shore 
and Michigan Southern, and was director of the 
Northern Pacific. He was in all his activities 
a leader to whom the Great Lakes owe much. 
Railroads built during these years in Ohio and 
Pennsylvania helped to solve the problem of iron 
transportation, while the freight traffic in iron ore 
helped these young roads to live. The enor- 
mous demand for iron, due to the great era of 
railroad building, made furnaces spring up in the 
Cleveland, Mahoning, and Shenango valleys, and 
the Michigan industry was fairly launched. 

For a long time only the Michigan and Wis- 



35^ The Story of the Great Lakes 

consin ranges were worked, but in 1875 the 
presence of large deposits in the Vermilion 
Range of Minnesota was brought by Mr. George 
Stone to the attention of Charlemagne Tower, a 
prominent lawyer and business man of Pennsyl- 
vania. Mr. Tower had had large experience in 
coal mining, both in the examination of coal 
fields in Pennsylvania for his cases in the law 
courts, and as an owner and manager of com- 
panies. He sent an expedition to explore the 
Minnesota ranges, and becoming convinced of 
their wealth proceeded at once to their develop- 
ment. The friends and business associates whom 
he endeavored to enlist in this venture were 
sceptical, so Mr. Tower had to proceed single- 
handed in his task. 

It is little wonder that men doubted the 
practicability of Mr. Tower's schemes ; it is the 
more worthy of admiration that he dared to 
undertake them amid the almost insuperable 
obstacles. To plant a mining establishment 
ninety miles north of Duluth and seventy miles 
west in a direct line from Lake Superior in a 
region that had no intermediate connections with 
even the outskirts of civilization seemed an 
impossible task. The country was densely 




From Stereoj^raph, copyright, lOOQ. by Underwood & Inderwood, New York. 

Iron Ore at a Lake Superior Port 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 353 

wooded, with only very small streams and im- 
passable swamps breaking the forest stretch. 
Provisions, supplies, tools, — everything needed 
for the camp must be taken either in midwinter 
over frozen ground and snow when the tempera- 
ture was usually forty degrees below zero, or in 
summer on the backs of men and in Indian 
canoes over a most circuitous route. A railroad 
must be built to carry the ore, and dock and 
harbor facilities must be provided on Lake Supe- 
rior. All this Charlemagne Tower undertook at 
the age of seventy-three, and carried through to 
a wonderful success. He built a railroad from 
the mines to Two Harbors on Lake Superior ; 
he selected Two Harbors as the best place for 
his docks, roundhouses, machine-shops, and saw- 
mills ; and he opened up his mines in the iron 
district. 

In August, 1884, the railroad was finished and 
the first shipments of ore were made. These 
shipments were shrewdly distributed among manu- 
facturers of three states leading in iron industries, 
Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, instead of being 
sent to a single dealer. They met with instant 
favor from all the companies. The quality of all 
the northern ranges had been found to be very 

2 A 



354 The Story of the Great Lakes 

fine. The percentage of metallic iron contained 
in the best red hematites shipped from the 
Michigan mines had been over sixty per cent ; 
this first shipment from Minnesota contained 
sixty-eight per cent, and with its success the 
future of the country was assured. The country 
opened up rapidly, the railroad was carried to 
Duluth, and a town sprang up about the docks 
at Two Harbors. In the first year 68,000 tons 
were shipped ; three years later the output had 
jumped to 400,000 tons, and Minnesota had 
been transformed in four years from a non-min- 
eral district into one of the foremost iron markets 
of the United States. Fifteen hundred men were 
working in its mines, and five thousand were 
directly or indirectly employed by the industry. 
In 1887 the Mesabi Range began to be opened 
up, and together the five ranges, — the Marquette, 
Gogebic, Menominee, Vermilion, and Mesabi, — 
located in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, 
supply to-day more iron than any single country 
in the world. 

This is the history of three of the leading in- 
dustries of the Great Lakes. In the nineteenth 
century there came to be many more which have 
contributed much to the prosperity of the region. 



Three Great Industries of the Lakes 355 

From the earliest occupation by the French the 
Great Lakes have offered not only a comfortable 
means of livelihood to the settler who came to 
their shores, but also wealth to the country which 
possessed them. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

SHIPPING ON THE LAKES 

NOWHERE has the life of the Great 
Lakes developed more clearly an indi- 
viduality of its own than in its ship- 
ping. The conditions which confronted the 
navigators on these great inland seas were pe- 
culiar to their environment. The size of the 
lakes made types of vessel designed for ocean use 
more suitable than river craft ; yet the fact that 
they were not one inland sea, but a succession of 
lakes divided by narrow channels, differentiated 
them widely from the ocean both in the needs and 
possibilities of their navigation. To meet these 
special conditions and to suit the demands of the 
commerce in which they were engaged the ship- 
builders of the lakes have designed vessels which 
are unique and interesting. 

The French found on the Great Lakes a type 
of boat which was so well adapted to the exi- 
gencies of combined lake and river travel that it 

356 



Shipping on the Lakes 357 

has persisted to this day. This was the birch- 
bark, canoe. But it was not the small pleasure 
canoe of our modern ideas. Even the first 
canoes that the Jesuit fathers found the Indians 
using before 1630 were large enough to transport 
a family of five or six with all their baggage, their 
kettles, blankets, and other household goods. 
With the development of the fur trade and the 
coming of white men in large numbers the canoes 
became twenty and thirty feet long, and this style 
persisted as the main water craft until well into 
the nineteenth century. The merchants from 
Montreal went up to Fort WilHam in a fleet of 
ninety canoes, each carrying four tons' burden and 
navigated by eight or ten men, and as late as 
1820 the furs of Lake Superior were sent south 
by John Jacob Astor from his depot at Mackinac 
to the trading post at Chicago in similar vessels. 
It was no uncommon occurrence to see at Mack- 
inac and Detroit a flotilla of fifty or sixty canoes 
sweep, up to the shore, the Indians paddling si- 
lently and the voyageurs singing a gay Canadian 
boat-song as they moved their paddles in swift 
unison at the rate of forty or even sixty strokes a 
minute. These men measured distances by the 
number of times they had stopped on the journey to 



358 The Story of the Great Lakes 

smoke, and would tell you that a place was 
" three or four pipes away/' because the call had 
been three times given for "pipes — pipes" by 
the steersman, and at the word every paddle had 
been drawn in, every pipe lighted, and a few 
whiffs taken before the three-minute rest was up 
and they started on again. Sometimes these 
rests were once in every two miles, sometimes 
less frequently, and with their help the men 
paddled from morning to night, singing as 
cheerily after their forty-mile run as in the 
morning. 

Other boats were used by the Indians and 
French, but not so unive;-sally. The Indian 
pirogue was a canoe-shaped boat hollowed out 
of one of the huge cotton-trees, — a vessel forty 
or fifty feet long and holding thirty men, but too 
heavy to carry easily around the numerous port- 
ages. The French introduced into the lakes 
in the eighteenth century the bateau, a flat-bot- 
tomed boat with sharp-pointed ends, which re- 
sisted the storms better than the clumsy scow 
barges, and was the precursor of the present 
two-masted Mackinaw boat. On the canoe and 
bateau sails were sometimes used, but only in very 
favorable weather, and in any of these boats all but 



Shipping on the Lakes 359 

the most experienced navigators hugged closely 
the shores of the stormy, wind-swept waters. To 
us with our eight and ten and twelve thousand 
ton steel vessels, which find the lake storms a 
source of dread and danger, it seems incredible 
that the greater part of the navigation for three 
centuries was in these frail, light canoes and 
bateaux. 

With the story of the pioneer sailing vessel of 
La Salle, the sixty-ton Griffon of the seventeenth 
century design, with her high stern deck and her 
two masts with clumsy square sails, we are already 
familiar. After she was lost in 1679, sailing ves- 
sels did not again appear on the lakes for nearly 
seventy-five years. Then there were two on 
Lake Superior, one the property of the man 
who made the first attempt at copper mining in 
that region. The first sailing vessels to come 
into historical importance were the Beaver and 
the Gladwin^ which did such efficient service at 
the siege of Detroit in 1763. War brought 
out the need of such vessels, and a shipyard 
started by the English on Navy Island in the 
Niagara River turned out several schooners dur- 
ing the next few years. At the end of the eigh- 
teenth century, however, the entire fleet of Lakes 



360 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Huron, Erie, and Michigan consisted of only 
three schooners and six sloops, and no one 
dreamed of the commercial changes to come 
before another century was over. Under the 
orders of the English government a Mr. ColUns 
had made in 1788 a careful survey of the lakes 
and had stated that vessels on Lake Ontario 
might be of sixty or even seventy-five or eighty 
tons, but those on the other lakes should not 
exceed fifteen tons' burden ; but the ship-builders 
paid little attention to his instructions. 

The steamboat made its appearance on the 
Great Lakes in 18 18 in the shape of a side- 
wheeler, naively called the Walk-in-the-WateVy 
which was launched at Buffalo. Even a con- 
temporary described her as a "weak but elegant 
boat," and an oil painting shows her to be a 
little craft with a curious tiller at the stern, no 
pilot-house, a smoke stack of six lengths of stove- 
pipe put together, and unboxed wheels. She was 
a profitable venture while she lasted, making the 
trip from Buffalo to Detroit with forty or fifty 
passengers, each of whom paid eighteen dollars, 
but often taking thirteen days to do it. For 
four years she held a monopoly on the lakes 
as the solitary steam-propelled craft, and then one 



e!te-s»«&<S'"S 





Cupyriglit, l;iii.j, by iJutruU l'uUli.-.luug I. u. 

The Old and the New 
General Cass's Canoe and a Modern Freight Steamer 



Shipping on the Lakes 361 

stormy night in October she went ashore after rid- 
ing out a furious gale. None of her passengers were 
lost, and there is an old picture portraying this 
mournful event, " one of the greatest misfortunes 
that has ever befallen us," as a journal of the day 
said. The vessel is depicted as going to pieces 
on the shore while its passengers stand up straight 
in unruffled silk hats, pointing apparently at spots 
of interest in the vicinity, — a very different state 
of affairs from that told of by those who spent 
that fearful night on the little vessel hoping for 
daylight to come before she was knocked to 
pieces. 

The steamboat did not disappear from the 
lakes, as the journal had feared it would, but in 
1827 the first steamboat reached Sault Ste. Marie, 
carrying among her passengers General Winfield 
Scott, who came to visit the military post there. 
She made no effort to pass the barrier of the 
rapids, as even the little canal built by the North- 
west Company in 1790 for canoes and bateaux 
had been blown up in the War of 18 12. The 
first steamboat reached Chicago in 1832, and 
from that time on they began to multiply on the 
lakes. It was not, however, till 1845 ^^^^ ^^^ 
need of steam navigation for working successfully 



362 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the rich copper mines south of Lake Superior 
made it so necessary to have some craft not 
dependent on the uncertainties of the wind that 
the mine owners combined and bought a Httle 
steamboat which they had hauled laboriously 
over the portage on rollers, an undertaking that 
occupied seven weeks. 

The great need of connecting the rich Lake 
Superior region with the other lakes, — urged 
upon the people for twenty years, — brought 
about in 1855 the building of the "Soo" Canal. 
After much discussion Congress voted in 1852 
three-quarters of a million acres of land to aid 
the state of Michigan in building this canal. 
This was done in spite of the opposition of 
many Eastern members to spending so much 
money on a project for so remote a wilderness. 
The type and size of the canal was fought over 
by engineers and statesmen, and it was finally 
agreed that a lock two hundred and fifty feet 
long would provide amply for any vessels that 
would ever navigate those waters. A young man 
who was visiting at Sault Ste. Marie at the time, 
Mr. Charles T. Harvey, became convinced that 
this was too small an estimate. Mr. Harvey was 
neither an engineer nor a canal builder, but was 



Shipping on the Lakes 2^3 

a man with foresight. He went before the legis- 
lature with plans, drawn under his direction by a 
New York engineer, for a lock at least one hun- 
dred feet longer, and was met with ridicule. The 
longest vessel on the lakes was then only one 
hundred and sixty-seven feet, and the lock pro- 
posed by Harvey and the Fairbanks Company, 
who were backing him, would be the largest lock 
in the world. Harvey won his point, and was 
given charge of constructing the canal. It was a 
tremendous undertaking for those days. The 
nearest railroad was many hundred miles away ; 
the steamboats were slow ; it took six weeks to 
get a reply to a letter mailed to New York, and 
agents had to be sent to that city to get gangs 
of laborers from the immigrant population. The 
temperature on the Sault was at thirty-five de- 
grees below zero much of the time during the 
winter months, and the men were necessarily 
poorly housed and cared for. At one time an 
epidemic of cholera killed ten per cent of the 
men, but work went on each day. Again two 
thousand laborers struck, and Harvey hid all 
the provisions in the woods until they returned 
to work, which they did in twenty-four hours. 
Within two years, and at a cost of less than a 



364 The Story of the Great Lakes 

million dollars, the canal was completed. Im- 
mediately the problems of lake navigation were 
entirely changed. One of the difficulties of the 
cautious Mr. Collins of seventy years before, 
who wanted the size of boats limited to fifteen 
tons, was removed in the building of a channel 
around the rapids of the Sault. In fifteen years 
the lock was enlarged and then later enlarged 
again, till in 1896 the famous eight-hundred-foot 
Poe lock was built by the army engineer of that 
name, at the cost of four million dollars. Mr. 
Harvey, at the fiftieth anniversary of the build- 
ing of his first lock, came to the celebration of 
the event and heard discussion of the possible 
need of a lock larger than the present one. Thus 
in the memory of living men there has been built 
up a great commercial marine of over five thousand 
vessels, and by the spending of fifty millions 
of dollars in deepening all the lake channels 
and cutting canals, the four upper lakes have 
been united into one great waterway over which 
passes a large proportion of the productive wealth 
of the United States. Yearly one hundred mil- 
lion tons of freight pass through this lock, which 
is twice the record of London and Liverpool 
combined in their twelve-month season. 



Shipping on the Lakes 365 

With the opening of the " Soo " Canal the old 
conventional type of lake vessel began to disap- 
pear, and the designs were accommodated to 
the special demands of trade and natural condi- 
tions. The sailing vessel is coming to be a thing 
of the past, and the men who navigated the tur- 
bulent waters and were caught in gales and ice- 
jams in their wooden schooners rejoice in its 
disappearance. Since 1873 the shipyards have 
built less and less of this type of ship, and in 
our own day the steel vessel has come to take 
its place. 

The canoe served its purpose for fur trade, 
and the schooner for lumber ; but the mineral 
industries of Lake Superior, and a little later 
the grain crops of the West, demanded a dif- 
ferent kind of vessel. With the coming of 
steam power and the development of the " Soo '* 
Canal came into being the style of vessel which 
has been well described as a " steel trough with 
a lid on it." These vessels are built solely to 
carry as much cargo as is consistent with safety. 
They are huge steel freighters five and six hun- 
dred feet long, with a hold whose capacity is 
from six to twelve thousand tons of iron ore 
or a like amount of wheat. Astern is the ma- 



^66 The Story of the Great Lakes 

chinery with a smoke stack and a row of cabins 
visible above the deck, and three or four hun- 
dred feet off — the length of a city block — 
is the deck-house, containing officers' quarters 
with the wheel-house and bridge. Within this 
house is invariably to be found a man of rare 
skill and experience. To the casual observer 
the narrow lake passages and the crowded, 
winding channels and flats of the rivers would 
seem to preclude so long and unwieldy a craft, 
but the lake sailor can navigate her with the string 
of barges which she often has in tow through any 
passage with skill and ease. The bows of these 
vessels are high and rounded to meet and part the 
heavy waves of the frequent lake storms, and the 
whole shell is built with special regard to strength, 
both to resist these gales and to bear the impact 
of the thousands of tons of wheat and iron which 
are to be poured from grain elevators and iron 
bins into their holds. A crew of twenty-five men 
can handle one of these vessels, but they have no 
easy time on long stretches between ports. They 
must be ever on the alert in their short, swift 
trips from lake to lake. 

In the short summer season the motto of lake 
transportation is speed, and science has bent its 



Shipping on the Lakes 367 

energies most successfully to that end. Up in 
the mines of Michigan and Minnesota a big 
steam-operated bucket dips down into the earth 
and scoops from the hillside a load of iron ore 
which it dumps into steel cars with openings at 
the bottom, at a cost of five cents a ton ! At the 
docks of Lake Superior, — and the total length 
of the ore docks on the lake is well over five 
miles, — the bottom of the car is turned aside 
and the whole load of red earth rushes either 
down long chutes directly into the holds of the 
vessels, or into big buildings called bins or pockets, 
from which it can be poured from a great height 
into the vessels filling them at fifteen or sixteen 
hatches simultaneously. Such records have been 
made as the loading of more than ten thousand 
tons of iron ore into a steamer in less than an 
hour and a half, and the usual time for the oper- 
ation is only three or four hours. The cost of 
this loading is made, by the use of this machinery, 
less than three cents a ton. After the swiftest 
passage that can be made the vessel reaches the 
ports of the lower lakes, and there the devices for 
unloading are even more wonderful. From a 
bridgelike crane hangs a huge scoop shaped like a 
clam-shell, which dips down into the vessel's hold 



368 The Story of the Great Lakes 

and pulls out ten tons of ore at a time, swings it 
to one side and drops it on a mountainous heap 
of red earth. From there it is put into steel cars 
which, at the furnaces of Pennsylvania, are picked 
off the track by an immense crane as though they 
were mere children's toys and dumped on the ore 
piles from which the furnaces are fed. In the 
interval while the ore was being unloaded from 
the hold of the vessel, coal for the return cargo 
has been poured in, and in an incredibly short 
time the freighter is started on her northward 
journey. So successfully have time and expense 
been minimized by the elimination of hand labor 
that the freight charges of the lakes are the 
wonder of the whole commercial world. Of 
some kinds of freight the cost of transporting 
a ton from Buffalo to Duluth is only eighty- 
five cents. The railroads have given up the 
attempt to compete and have bought up instead 
the lines of steamers with which they make con- 
nection. The recent tendency on the lakes is 
to consolidation of ownership. To-day the Pitts- 
burg Steamship Company owns a fleet of one 
hundred and eight vessels, whose total length 
if put in one long line would be over eight 
miles. These fleets are many times the size of 



Shipping on the Lakes 369 

those owned by Americans on the ocean. In- 
deed, this is one of the striking contrasts between 
lake and ocean traffic. A very large proportion 
of lake vessels is owned by Americans, while the 
reverse is true on the ocean. 

Grain is handled in much the same manner as 
iron ore. Millions of bushels come into the 
ports of Lake Michigan and Lake Superior, — to 
Fort WilHam, Duluth, West Superior, Milwau- 
kee, Chicago, and minor ports, — and are stored 
in huge fireproof buildings on the water front, 
known as grain elevators. These structures are 
of all sizes, holding from thirty and forty thou- 
sand bushels of wheat to a million or more. They 
are equipped with machinery for scouring, clean- 
ing, and drying the grain, and for pouring it 
into the vessels. The unloading is done either 
by means of an endless chain of buckets which 
work on a long spout or " leg *' lowered into 
the hatch, or by " pipes " or shafts from the ele- 
vators into the fifteen or twenty hatches. Down 
these pipes the grain rushes with a buzzing sound 
at the rate of one hundred and twenty-five thou- 
sand bushels an hour. For the unloading process 
the grain is drawn out by suction through similar 
pipes, the force supplied by powerful engines 

2B 



370 The Story of the Great Lakes 

which give a pressure of several hundred pounds 
to the square inch. In 1907 grain came into the 
lake ports which would have made, when con- 
verted into flour, forty-three million barrels of 
flour. Reckoning that two hundred and fifty 
one-pound loaves can be made from a barrel, this 
grain would have supplied the world with ten 
billion loaves of bread. 

Chicago and Buffalo, the principal gateways of 
entrance and exit for grain, have large systems of 
elevators with a capacity of millions of bushels, 
and in the winter months these are not suflicient, 
but the ice-bound vessels as they wait in the har- 
bors of Chicago and Lake Superior become float- 
ing storage warehouses, ready to sail east with 
their cargoes the moment navigation is open. 

These cargo freighters, with the huge barges 
of similar construction that they tow behind them 
in lines of two or three, are the most character- 
istic vessels of the lakes. Another style of ship, 
of which much was expected at the time of its in- 
vention, was the whaleback, a long, cigar-shaped 
steel craft whose decks were so low that they 
were constantly washed by the waves. These 
boats were designed, as are all lake boats, to have 
the greatest possible empty space for cargo, a 



Shipping on the Lakes 371 

condition made possible by the fact that in their 
short voyages they do not need to carry large 
stores of coal or provisions. The whaleback is 
a blunt-ended hulk with rounded gunwales, which 
from its appearance and from its manner of root- 
ing and rolling about in the waves has gained the 
lake nickname of the " pig-" These vessels are 
unique and picturesque, but not so successful as 
the usual style of freighters. Moreover, they 
have reached their maximum size and cannot be 
improved or enlarged without change of shape. 

The passenger steamers of the lakes are models 
of comfort, built more and more on the style, and 
even approximating the size of, the ocean liners, 
and after them there remains only one other type 
of vessel that deserves mention, — the ice-breaker. 
The situation of the Great Lakes on the extreme 
confines of the region whose climate makes it fit 
for the uses of civilized man keeps them ice- 
bound and closes their commerce for five months 
in the year. Early in April vessel owners begin 
to watch with interest the straits of Mackinac, 
Sault Ste. Marie, and Detroit. When the chan- 
nel at Mackinac shows water instead of ice, navi- 
gation of the lakes has opened. Then strong 
ice-breakers force their way through the floating 



372 The Story of the Great Lakes 

ice with a string of vessels at their sterns. They 
are powerful craft with a screw at the bow as well 
as at the stern, the first to suck the water from 
under the ice so that the boat climbing upon it 
may crush it down, breaking it and throwing it 
out of the way, and the second to propel the ves- 
sel through the two or three or even four feet of 
solid blue ice that have been broken in this way. 
This is an American invention which has been 
copied in all northern waters. Russia sent one 
of her foremost generals to study its construction, 
and it is now in use on her frozen lakes and seas. 
The tale of lake shipping is a tale that can 
only be begun in the limits of a single chapter. 
There are the car-ferries of Detroit, by which 
trains are carried across the river. These are 
now so crowded that a tunnel under the river is 
in process of construction to relieve the conges- 
tion. There are the stories of traffic at the " Soo " 
Canal, through which for six months of the year 
a big steamer passes in every fifteen minutes of 
the night and day, and of the Detroit River, with 
a record of a vessel every thirteen minutes, and 
of an average of two hundred tons of freight a 
minute for a season of two hundred and thirty 
days. There are the ship-building yards at 



Shipping on the Lakes 373 

Cleveland, where thirty-one steel freighters were 
ordered in a single winter, and more are turned 
out every year. The ships of the lakes are built 
on the lakes, and the shipyards are among the 
busiest centres of all that country. Lastly, there 
is the sad tale of wrecks and loss of lives, for since 
the first canoes were lost and the Griffon and the 
Walk-in-the-Water went down, the waters have 
exacted their annual toll, and fishing schooners and 
seven-thousand-ton freighters alike have broken 
in two or have foundered and been dashed to 
pieces on the rocks, while of the tale of hairbreadth 
escapes there is no end. 

Lake shipping within the limits of its own 
waterways has developed in the nineteenth cen- 
tury. In the twentieth is to come the connect- 
ing of the lakes with the Atlantic by canal and 
river, and the story of the twentieth century will 
be of vessels going direct from the ports of the 
Great Lakes to the ports of the Old World. 
With this prophecy the tale would seem to be 
complete. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CITY 

THE last sixty years of the nineteenth 
century witnessed on the shores of the 
Great Lakes the development of the 
city. The towns which we have traced through 
their early stages as forts, trading posts, and 
villages began in 1840 to make their appearance 
on the census lists with populations that could be 
counted in thousands instead of hundreds. If 
we reckon a population of eight thousand or over 
as the requisite number to raise a town to the 
rank of city, Buffalo with eighteen thousand and 
Detroit with nine thousand inhabitants were in 
1840 the only cities on the lakes. Cleveland 
had six thousand, and Chicago and Milwaukee 
timidly entered the lists with records of less than 
five thousand and two thousand respectively. In 
the proportionate size of cities in the whole 
United States these five ranged from being six- 
teenth, as was Buffalo, to being fifty-fourth, as 

374 



The Development of the City 375 

was Chicago, and down to Milwaukee, which was 
the seventy-ninth on the list. In 1906 these five 
cities are among the first twelve on the list, and 
their joint population is three million six hun- 
dred thousand, nearly one hundred times the to- 
tal population of sixty-five years ago. Figures 
express this change as well as anything can, but 
even figures can hardly suggest the wonder of 
this unparalleled development. It makes this 
last era of the life of the Great Lakes one of 
great and unique interest. 

Immediately after 1840 this swift growth of 
the city began. Within twenty years Detroit 
was five times as large as in 1840, Buffalo and 
Cleveland were seven times as large, while Chi- 
cago and Milwaukee had multiplied their num- 
bers by twenty and twenty-five. Smaller cities, 
too, like Toledo had had a rapid increase in their 
population. This sudden tide of immigration 
and of urban concentration was the natural result 
of the widespread westward movement of the 
twenty-five preceding years which had developed 
the country and created demands for central 
markets, and of the rise of the great industries 
described in the preceding chapters with their 
attendants, the railroad and the steamboat. No 



2']6 The Story of the Great Lakes 

communities have ever come into being for more 
immediate commercial reasons than the cities of 
the Great Lakes, and the immense wealth derived 
from their great industries has been directly 
responsible for their rapid growth and succeeding 
prosperity. With this story of the industrial side 
of the life of the lakes we are all familiar. 
Each city has necessarily passed through a stage 
when it spent its time and energy trying with 
breathless haste to keep pace with the outside 
demands made upon it by commerce. Now that 
stage has passed, at least in so far as this indus- 
trial side takes precedence over everything else 
and stands out preeminent and alone as the 
characteristic spirit of the lake city. Great 
fortunes have been and are being made, and 
reasonable prosperity has come to thousands of 
citizens. The last twenty years have seen these 
cities broaden their interests, and stand out as 
centres of education, art, sociology, politics, and 
religion, till now they are leaders as types of all- 
round development, including all these and many 
other lines. 

Each city claims and has a right to claim an 
individual spirit and an achievement of its own. 
But to the student of the past and present of 



The Development of the City 377 

these lake dwellers there comes the evidence of a 
broader unity under whose general aims and 
purposes, fostered by similar conditions, the local 
successes have been accomplished. 

In* education these cities are preeminent. 
They have been willing to expend large sums on 
the public school systems, and have adapted high 
educational principles to local needs with an 
independence that has made for a departure from 
many old and conventional methods, but has 
resulted almost always in greater efficiency. The 
large proportion of foreign-born children in the 
public schools has created many problems and 
brought the opportunity for great success in 
dealing with them. Nor does state and city 
interest stop with the usual public school system. 
Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio, Indiana, 
and Illinois have strong state universities, for 
w^hose support they give lavishly ; and beside 
them have grown up three other great univer- 
sities, Chicago and Northwestern in. Chicago, and 
the Western Reserve in Cleveland. There is a 
widespread enthusiasm for higher education, and 
these educational centres exert a great influence 
both as scientific experiment stations, whose dis- 
coveries are hailed with delight by the farmer and 



378 The Story of the Great Lakes 

the mechanic, and as dominant centres of thought. 
The universities and schools do not wait for the 
people to come within their walls. They go out 
with exhibitions and instruction of all kinds. 
The state legislatures have instituted systerhs of 
travelling and branch libraries, and education is 
being diffused among the people. 

As a natural result of high average intelligence 
and of industrial conditions there has originated 
in the region bordering on the lakes a political 
unrest which is being worked out, under the 
leadership of the cities, into an encouraging in- 
dependence of party spirit and a striving for the 
improvement of municipal and state conditions. 
With the coming of the city there have arisen 
problems entirely new to the administrators, and 
these each city is working out in its own way. 
Cleveland by government by commission, and 
the other cities by reform mayors running on 
independent platforms, and everywhere by in- 
telligent open discussion of such questions as 
municipal ownership of street railways, control 
of corporations, labor questions, and other matters 
of public interest which make the party divisions 
based on live social and industrial issues, not on 
state and national party platforms. The region 



The Development of the City 379 

of the lower lakes is a political storm centre for 
the nation as well as for the immediate locality, 
and conditions there are likely to have great in- 
fluence throughout the country. 

Municipal improvement has long been the 
watchword of all parties, and the result has been 
the development of splendid water fronts, the 
setting apart of land for beautiful park and boule- 
vard systems, the provision of playgrounds for 
children, and the constant beautifying of the cities. 
Modern architecture has had its chance here, and 
has proved itself. The results have made our 
modern lake city the admiration of all visitors, 
both from this country and from across the water. 

The two periods of rapid industrial growth 
and of broadening self-improvement each lake 
city has passed through in the last sixty years. 
Into the local details of each we have not space 
to enter, although each is an interesting story by 
itself. One city has come to be in size and stand- 
ing the second city of our nation, and in passing 
briefly over the steps of her growth we can see 
on a large scale what have been the conditions 
which have been met in a smaller way by her 
neighboring cities. 

With our traveller of 1 840, we visited Chicago 



380 The Story of the Great Lakes 

and found her a flourishing and rapidly increasing 
town of nearly five thousand inhabitants. Even 
then she was recognized as a centre for the region 
immediately surrounding her. The radius of her 
influence has extended in a way that would have 
seemed at that time inconceivable. Her popula- 
tion has run up to over two millions, and in 
wealth as well she has come to be the second 
great financial centre of the United States, rank- 
ing in this as in population next to New York. 
She began her city life in 1837 with $1993 in her 
treasury. To get money for sanitary drainage, 
for paving a few streets, and purchasing two fire 
engines the finance committee of the common 
council applied to the State Bank of Illinois for a 
loan of twenty-five thousand dollars, to be paid 
back within five years, — a request which the 
State Bank politely but curtly declined to grant. 
To-day her bank clearances amount to some 
seven thousand million dollars. And so we 
might go on with striking and astonishing con- 
trasts. We have come to take large statements 
and superlative adjectives for granted about 
Chicago's size, wealth, and commerce. Do we 
realize that she is the leading lake city in the 
other lines of which we have spoken ? 



The Development of the City 381 

The public school system of Chicago with its 
million of children has been and is being devel- 
oped along the best modern pedagogical princi- 
ples by men and women who are recognized 
leaders in the educational world. As a centre for 
higher education the city takes high rank. Be- 
sides its technical schools, like the Armour In- 
stitute, it has two great universities, Chicago and 
Northwestern. The former began its career 
when John D. Rockefeller decided to take the 
name and property of the old denominational 
university of that name, sold at auction under 
foreclosure, and to found a great institution. To 
this end he set apart a large sum of money and 
secured as president Dr. William R. Harper of 
Yale. With the remarkable growth of the uni- 
versity since it opened in 1892 with seven hun- 
dred and two students, we are all familiar. 

In music and art Chicago is preeminent, both 
for its high grade of achievement and for the 
widespread diffusion of its culture among its 
citizens. In 1905 Orchestra Hall was dedicated 
as a home for music, and this building, one of 
the finest in the world, had been built by a popu- 
lar subscription, to which thousands of the middle 
and poorer classes contributed their dollars. The 



382 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Chicago Art Institute has an attendance yearly of 
over half a million visitors, a number exceeding 
that of any art museum in America, and its 
library is consulted annually by fifty thousand 
people. Such a record is remarkable, and such 
enthusiasm has produced and is producing rec- 
ognized artists. In architectural excellence the 
story is the same. In philanthropy and social 
settlement work Hull House, under the leader- 
ship of Jane Addams, is only the most conspicuous 
of many powerful agencies for good. 

For the Great Lakes to have developed, in the 
sixty years that have marked the growth of the 
big city throughout the land, five of the twelve 
largest cities of the United States is a remark- 
able showing. Not only have these cities become 
leaders industrially, politically, and socially, but 
they are constantly increasing at a rapid rate in 
size, volume of commerce, and most of all in 
plans and forecasts for the future. From 1880 
to 1890 the most rapid growth of the city was in 
this region. During these ten years, while the 
rate of increase of the ocean ports ranged from 
San Francisco's fourteen per cent to New York's 
thirty-eight per cent, and that of the river cities 
from Cincinnati's nine per cent to St. Louis' 



The Development of the City 383 

twenty-seven, no one of the six great ports of the 
lakes fell below an increase of thirty-seven per 
cent, and Chicago's ran up to fifty-four, and 
Toledo's to sixty-one. This is a striking exhibi- 
tion of the movement of population in the wake 
of commercial opportunity. 

In the Old World such a group of cities situ- 
ated close together on immense bodies of water 
would create an individual empire of great wealth 
and prosperity. In the United States they are 
recognized as a leading factor in our prosperity, 
and a centre from which not only will great wealth 
and natural resources be evolved and distributed, 
but great leaders, great policies, and great ideals 
will come forth, making the lake region a force to 
be reckoned with and depended upon in the 
future of the Nation. 



A BRIEF LIST OF BOOKS 

General Works 

There is no important general work covering the entire field. 
The best single book is Charles Moore's The Northwest under 
Three Flags, 1635-1796. B. A. Hinsdale's Old Northwest 
(2 vols.) deals w^ith this region, but with especial emphasis on 
the geographical and political phases. Francis Parkman treats 
of French and English occupation in his Series of Historical 
Narratives, France and England in North America, the nine vol- 
umes of which will be cited under their individual names. 
Besides his Narrative and Critical History of America in eight 
volumes, Justin Winsor has three books on the history of this 
region: Cdrtier to Frontenac, 1 534-1 700; The Mississippi 
Basin; and The Westward Movement. Under this heading 
should be mentioned the publications of the various historical 
societies of the lake states, especially the Buffalo, Michigan, 
Wisconsin, and Minnesota collections. 

Part I. Discovery and Exploration., 161 5—1 700 

This period is taken up in Parkman' s Pioneers of France in 
the New World, The Jesuits in North America, La Salle and 
the Discovery of the Great West, and Count Frontenac and New 
France under Louis XIV. The seventy-three volumes o( Jesuit 
Relations and Allied Volumes, edited by Reuben Gold Thwaites, 
are the source books for accounts of the Jesuits. A modern 

2C 385 



386 The Story of the Great Lakes 

book which covers this period is C. W. Colby's Canadian 
Types of the Old Regime, 1 608-1698. E. B. O'Callaghan's 
Documentary History of the State of New Tork (4 vols. ), I 849, 
and L. H. Morgan's League of the Iroquois (2 vols.), 1901, 
give good accounts of the Indians, while the former has reprints 
of valuable maps and documents. 

The original accounts of the voyages of the explorers are as 
follows : Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, translated by C. P. 
Otis, and edited by E. F. Slafter (3 vols.) (a handy one- 
volume edition is that of W. L. Grant, 1907); Relation of the 
Discoveries and Voyages of Cavelier de La Salle from 1 679 to 
1681, translated by M. B. Anderson; and Louis Hennepin's 
A New Discovery of a Vast Country in America (2 vols.), and 
Lahontan's New Voyages to North America, both reprinted and 
edited by R. G. Thwaites. C. W. Butterfield has written a 
History of Brule's Discoveries and Explorations, 1610-1626. 
The story of the pageant of Saint Lusson comes to us from his 
Proces- Verbal in the Wisconsin Historical Collections, xi, 26, 
and in Father Claude Dablon's account in the Jesuit Relations, 
Iv, 105-1 15. 

Part II. The Struggle for Possession^ 1 700-1 832 

For the struggle between France and England Parkman's 
Half Century of Conflict (2 vols.), Montcalm and Wolfe 
(2 vols.), and Conspiracy of Pontiac (2 vols.) give the best 
connected account. S. Farmer's History of Detroit and Michi- 
gan, A. Hulbert's The Niagara River, and other local histories 
of Michigan, New York, Ohio, and Niagara, as well as chroni- 
cles of the war, contribute to this history. Mr. C. M. Burton 
has published a very interesting pamphlet on Cadillac's Village, 
or Detroit under Cadillac, which is the result of his own re- 
search in the records of this time. Besides Parkman's two- 



A Brief List of Books 387 

volume story of the Conspiracy of Pontiac, it is well to read 
Major Robert Rogers' Journals of the Siege of Detroit, and 
Concise Account of North Jmertca, 1765, and also a Diary of 
the Siege of Detroit, edited with other documents by F. B, 
Hough, and The Gladwin Manuscripts, edited by Charles 
Moore. Alexander Henry tells his own story in Travels and 
Adventures in Canada and the Indian Territories, 1809. 

For the period of the war between England and America, 
Henry Adams' History of the United States, 1 800-1 81 7 
(9 vols.), is the authority. T. Roosevelt in his The Winning 
of the West, 1 777-1807 (5 vols.), gives his fifth volume to 
St. Clair and Wayne. There are three standard works on the 
naval part of the war, J. Barnes' Naval Actions of the War of 
1 81 2, Roosevelt's The Naval War of 18 1 2, and A. T. 
Mahan's Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1 81 2 
(2 vols.). There are many contemporary accounts of the 
battles and defences of the leading participants, such as The 
Defence of Brigadier-General Hull Written by Himself, I 8 1 4. 
Three leading documents of the Chicago massacre are the Nar- 
rative of the Massacre at Chicago, 1844, supposed to be the 
Kinzie account. The Chicago Massacre in 181 2, which is the 
Heald account, written at a much later date by Joseph Kirkland, 
and an anonymous document in the Michigan Pioneer and His- 
torical Collections, viii, 648-652. The Black Hawk War is 
treated in all histories of the time. The material about Black 
Hawk himself is gathered from B. Drake's Life and Adventures 
of Black Hawk (7th ed., 1846), Life of Black Hawk, Dictated 
by Himself, 1834, and S. G. Drake's Book of the Indians 
(8th ed., 1 841), which has also accounts of Pontiac and Te- 
cumseh. R. G. Thwaites' How George Rogers Clark Won 
the Northwest, has an essay on the Black Hawk War, as well 
as other interesting essays on this period, Randall Parrish's 



388 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Historic Illinois should be mentioned in this connection as the 
best book of its kind on this whole region, with a clear account 
of the events that took place in Illinois and a graphic picture of 
pioneer conditions. 

The biographies of Cass and Wayne are valuable. The two 
contemporary books on Cass are W. L. G. Smith's The Life 
and Times of Lewis Cass, and W. T. Young's Life and Public 
Services of Lewis Cass. A. C. McLaughlin has written a good 
biography with the title, Lewis Cass, for the American States- 
man Series. John R, Spears is the author of a biography of 
Anthony Wayne, 1903. 

Part III. Occupation and Development 

The bibliography of this section would include all that has 
come before, and much from pamphlets, historical society publi- 
cations, local histories, and records of anniversary celebrations, 
which would make too long a list of sources. There are no 
general works on this phase of the life of the Great Lakes. 
Archer B. Hulbert's Historic Highways of America (16 vols.) 
contains much that is of interest about roads to the lakes, espe- 
cially in volumes i, 2, 7, 8, 11, 12, and 14. J. F. Rhodes' 
History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850 
(7 vols.) has in its earlier volumes valuable references and 
accounts of happenings in its period. In general, however, one 
must turn to the local records and state histories. 

L. P. Powell has gathered and edited two volumes entitled 
Historic Towns of the Middle States, and Historic Towns of 
the Western States. Seven suggestive books are: Parker's 
Rochester, A Story Historical, and H. O'Reilly's Sketches of 
Rochester: The Niagara Book, by W. D. Howells, N. S. 
Shaler, and others, and F. H. Severance's Old Trails on the 
Niagara Frontier ; Urann's Centennial History of Cleveland ; 



A Brief List of Books 389 

W. P. Strickland's Old Mackinaw, i860; and A. T. Andreas* 
History of Chicago (3 vols.). 

The Buffalo Historical Collections have much material about 
the Erie Canal, as has W. W. Campbell's Life and fVritings 
of De Witt Clinton. J. L. Barton's Commerce of the Lakes and 
the Erie Canal, William Norris' Map of the Railroads and 
Canals in the United States and Canada, August, 1834, Early 
Chicago Railroads, 1 838, and W. K. Ackerman's Early 
Illinois Railroads, in Fergus Historical Series, No. 23, pp. 3— 
62, and a little book. Instructions for Running Railroads^ I 862, 
are all good for the years of rapid development about the lakes. 
Two other books on railroads should be included : F. H. 
Spearman's The Strategy of Great Railroads and Mott's 
Between Ocean and Lakes. 

There are two contemporary lives of Stephen A. Douglas, 
one by J. W. Sheahan, published in i860 for campaign pur- 
poses, and another. The Life and Speeches of Stephen A. 
Douglas, by a ** Member of the Western Bar." Allen Johnson 
has recently brought out a valuable life of this Illinois statesman. 
Nicolay and Hay's Abraham Lincoln, A History (10 vols.) is 
the standard work on Lincoln. J. W. Headley has written on 
Confederate Operations in Canada and New Tork, giving an 
intimate account of events in which he played an active part. 
F. J. Turner is the authority on the fur trade, which he has 
described in The Character and Influence of the Indian Trade 
in Wisconsin, Johns Hopkins Studies, Vol. IX. 

Gazetteers and Travels 

In the numerous guide-books and records of travellers of the 
past one hundred and twenty-five years is written most vividly 
the story of the Great Lakes. Each one of those we mention 
contributes something to the account of the region. 



3 90 The Story of the Great Lakes 

Travels. J. Carver's Travels through the Interior Parts of 
North America tn 1766, 1767, 1768; I. Weld's Travels^ 
1795-^797 5 J* Harriott's Struggles through Lije^ etc., 1796, 
11,97-149; SutclifF's Travels, 1804, 1805, 1806; John 
Melish's Travels in the United States in 1806 and 1807 and 
1809, 1 8 10, 181 I (2 vols.); Schultz' Travels on an Inland 
Voyage, 1 807 and 1 808 ; F. Hall's Travels in I 8 1 6 and 1 8 1 7 ; 
J. M. Duncan's Travels, 11, 3-120; Views of Society and 
Manners in America, 1 8 1 8-1 820, pp. I 25-1 8 1 ; H. R. School- 
craft's Narrative Journal of Travels from Detroit Northwest tn 
1820, which gives an official account of the Cass expedition; 
William Dalton's Travels, 1821 ; P. ^i^nshnry' s Pedestrian Tour 
in 1 8 2 1 , giving an account of a trip from Albany to Niagara ; 
C. H. Wilson's The Wanderer in America, 1 823; T. L. 
McKenney's Sketches of a Tour to the Lakes, v^hlch Is very 
valuable; Basil Hall's Travels in North America in 1827 
and 1828, treating In vol. 1 of this region; Anne Royall's 
Black Book, vol. 1; John Fowler's Journal of a Tour in the 
State of New Tork in 1830-1831. We come now to a set 
of travels which tell of the western lakes in particular and give a 
picture of their towns: A Winter in the West, by a New 
Torker (2 vols.), 1835; Life on the Lakes, telling of a Lake 
Superior trip in 1836 by the author of ** Legends of a Log 
Cabin"; Bela Hubbard's Memorials of Half a Century, also 
of a voyage to Lake Superior. J. L. Peyton's Over the Alle- 
ghanies and Across the Prairies, 1848, and Captain Mac- 
kinnon's Atlantic and Trans-Atlantic Sketches^ 1, 141-233, 
give vivid pictures of lake travel. Lillian Foster was in Chicago 
in 1 860, and tells in Wayside Glimpses, pp. 200-224, ^^^ impres- 
sions of Douglas and the political situation. Margaret Fuller 
spent a Summer on the Lakes in 1 843 ; Charles Dickens went 
to Niagara, which he describes in his American Notes, 1842, 



A Brief List of Books 391 

and Harriet Martineau wrote a Retrospect of Western Travel 
(3 vols.), 1838, in which she devotes seventy pages of the first 
volume to a trip from Albany to Niagara. Two accounts of 
travel in Minnesota are E. S. Seymour's Sketches of Minnesota, 
1850, and C. C. Andrews' Minnesota and Dacotahy 1857. 

Gazetteers and Guides (arranged alphabetically). S. R. 
Brown's The Western Gazetteer, 181 7; E. Dana's Description 
of the Bounty Lands of Illinois in 1 8 19, and Geographical 
Sketches on the Western Country, I 8 19; William Darby's Emi- 
grants' Guide to the Western and Southwestern States and Ter- 
ritories, 1818; G. M. Davison's The Fashionable Tour, with 
several successive editions under the title. The Traveller's Guide, 
1 830-1 840; J. Disturnell's The Western Traveller, 1844, and 
A Trip through the Lakes of North America, 1857; T. 
D wight's The Northern Traveller; A. D. Jones' Illinois and 
the West, 1838, which is especially good on pioneer conditions; 
John Melish's Geographical Description of the United States, 
Information and Advice to Emigrants, and Traveller'* s Direc- 
tory, 1815-1826; S. A. Mitchell's Illinois in 1837; J. M. 
Peck's Gazetteer of Illinois, Guide for Emigrants, and New 
Guide for Emigrants to the West, 1 831-1848; J. C. Smith's 
The Western Tourist, 1840, and Steele's Western Guide-Books, 
I 830-1 840; H. SpofFord's Pocket Guide of the State of New 
York, 1824; H. S. Tanner's The American Traveller (8th ed., 
1842); and George Temple's The American Tourist's Pocket 
Companion, I 812. 



INDEX 



Adrian, 276, 285. 

Albany, 91, 102, 228, 232, 237, 242, 

248, 252, 256, 259. 
Allouez, Father Claude, 41 ; address 

to Indians, 45-47. 
American Fur Company, 338. 
Anderson, Robert, 207. 
Andre, Father Louis, 41. 
Astor, John Jacob, 338, 357. 

Barclay, Commodore, in command 
of British fleet on Lake Erie, 182, 
183; defeated by Perry, 184-187. 

Battles, Niagara, 108-111; Bloody 
Run, 129, 130; Fallen Timbers, 
160, 161; Tippecanoe, 166; 
River Raisin, 180, 181; Lake 
Erie, 183-187; TheThames, 188, 
189; Chippewa Creek, 189; 
Lundy's Lane, 189; Wisconsin 
Heights, 210, 211; Bad Axe, 
211. 

Beall, John Yates, Confederate 
agent on the lakes, 322-326, 328, 

329- 

Bibliography, 385-391. 

Black Hawk, appearance and early 
career, 201-203; his war, 205- 
212; his eastern trip, 212-214. 

Black Rock, 181, 182, 254. 

Boone, Daniel, at Detroit, 152. 

Brebeuf, Father Jean, Jesuit mis- 
sionary to Hurons, 25-37 ; founder 
of mission, 25; life among In- 
dians, 25-33; killed by Iroquois, 

37- 

Brock, Gen. Isaac, captures De- 
troit for British, 168-172. 

Brule, Etienne, first white man to 
see Lake Huron, 10, 14. 

Buffalo, founded, 220, 221; in 181 1, 
246, 247; tenninus of Erie Canal, 



254-256, 260; in 1840, 266-269; 
lumber market, 345, 346; first 
steamboat launched at, 360; 
grain elevators, 370; rapid 
growth, 374, 375. 
Buffalo roads, 229, 230. 

Cadillac, La Mothe, founder of De- 
troit, 88-98; character, 88; at 
Mackinac, 88; at Detroit, 89- 
98. 

Cadillac, Madame, 96. 

Campbell, Capt., 124, 126. 

Camp Douglas, 319-322, 326. 

Canals, Welland, 5, 283; Henne- 
pin, 6; Rock River, 224; Penn- 
sylvania and Erie, 272, 284; Ohio 
and Erie, 273, 283, 284; Wabash 
and Erie, 276, 284; Miami, 284; 
Erie, see under Erie; "Soo," see 
under Sault Ste. Marie.. 

Cass, Lewis, in War of 181 2, 170; 
governor of Michigan territory, 
191-200; early life, 192; manage- 
ment of the territory, 193-196; 
dealings with Indians, 196-200; 
at Duluth, 200, 224, 225. 

Champlain, Samuel de, on Lake 
Huron, 10, 14; early career, 12, 
13; among the Hurons, 14-23; 
his writings, 23, 24. 

Chicago, military post, 166; mas- 
sacre at, 172-177; under Gov- 
ernor Cass, 193, 198, 200; town 
begun, 222, 223; in 1840, 266, 
275-279; Lincoln and Douglas 
in, 299-316; in Civil War, 318- 
322, 327-329; first steamboat 
to, 361; grain elevators, 369, 370; 
the modern city, 379-383; see 
also Chicago River, and Fort 
Dearborn. 



393 



394 



Index 



Chicago University, 319, 381. 

Cleveland, founded, 164, 165, 219, 
220; in 1840, 272, 273; coming 
of the first train, 289-291 ; com- 
merce, 291, 350, 351; shipyards, 
372, 373; rapid growth, 374, 375. 

377, 378- 
Cleveland, Moses, 164, 219. 
CHnton, De Witt, and the Erie 

Canal, 237, 238, 251, 254-260. 
Confederate operations on the lakes, 

317-329- 
Connecticut, land cession, 219. 
Conventions, National Republican 

of i860, 300, 311-314; National 

Democratic of 1864, 321, 322. 
Coureurs de bois, 41, 47, 107, ^33^ 

334. 

Dablon, Father Claude, 41. 

Dalyell, Capt., at siege of Detroit, 
128, 129; killed, 130. 

Davis, Jefferson, in Black Hawk 
War, 207; sends commissioners 
to Canada, 317. 

Davison, Gideon, his Travellers' 
Guides, 267-269. 

Denonville, governor of New 
France, 87, 104. 

Detroit, founded by French, 87-100; 
taken by British, 116; blockaded 
by Pontiac, 11 8-1 34; in 1776, 
1 51-153; an American post, 154, 
163, 164; taken by British, 166- 
172; under Gov. Cass, 194, 195; 
fixe at, 221; in 1840, 274, 275; 
terminus of Michigan Central, 
288; rapid growth, 374, 375. 

Detroit River, visited by La Salle, 
62, 63; first recorded passage 
of, 63; importance of, 88-91; 
beauty of, 91-93; military opera- 
tions on, 125-131, 167-170, 187, 
190, 323, 325; commerce of, 

371-373- 
Douglas, Stephen A., 299-316; 
early career, 302-306; debates 
with Lincoln, 300, 309-311; 
Senator, 305, 311, 314, 315; sup- 



porter of Lincoln, 314-316; 

death, 316. 
Druilletes, Gabriel, 41. 
Du Luth, Daniel G., 224, 334, 

335- 
Duluth, Indian trading station, 224, 

225, 334; becomes a town, 225; 

commerce of, 344, 354, 369. 
Dunkirk, railroad celebration at, 

291-293. 

Erie, Lake, discovered and explored, 
61, 63; forts on, 104, 108, 109, 
118, 125, 164; in War of 1812, 
165-168, 179-190; settlements 
on, 219, 220; roads, canals, and 
railroads to, 232-241, 242, 251- 
265, 283-297; travel on, 268-' 
274; in Civil War, 322-326; 
commerce of, 343, 345, 360. 

Erie, Penn., in 1840, 268, 272; rail- 
road war, 294-298; underground 
railroad station, 302 ; see also 
Presque Isle under Forts. 

Erie Canal, 5, 195, 221, 226, 237, 
238, 251-265; building of, 251- 
254; ceremony of opening, 254- 
260; travel on, 261-263; en- 
larged, 263-265; 271, 283. 

Forts, Frontenac, 52, 61, 105, 218; 
Duquesne, 104; Le Boeuf, 104, 
106, 109; Sandusky, 104, 125, 
219; Venango, 104, 106, 291; 
Presque Isle, 104, 106, 109, 118, 
125, 164, 219; Washington, 158; 
Recovery, 158; Defiance, 159; 
Harrison, 166; Dearborn, 166, 
172-177; Wayne, 166, 174, 276; 
Maiden, 167-170, 180, 183, 187, 
188; William, 338-341. 

Franklin, Benjamin, makes Great 
Lakes U.S. boundary, 347. 

Frenchtown, Hull at, 167; Ameri- 
can defeat at, 1 79-1 81. 

Frontenac, governor of New France, 
50, 59, 67; recalled, 73; returns, 
87; his plan to occupy Great 
Lakes, 87, 88; death, 87. 



Index 



39S 



Fuller, Margaret, trip to the lakes, 
278-282. 

Fur trade, carried on by French and 
English, 39, 51, 52, 66-68, 88, 
89, loi, 102, 135, 145; leading 
interest on the lakes, 330-342 ; 
under the French, 331-335; 
under the British, 335-342; under 
the Americans, 155, 165, 337, 338, 
341, 347. 

Genesee Turnpike, 233. 

Georgian Bay, 10, 12, 14, 25, 28, 
148, 218. 

Gladwin, Major, in command at 
Detroit, 119; blockaded by Pon- 
tiac, 1 19-133; saves Detroit, 133. 

Grain, handled by lake ports, 6, 

369. 370- 
Greeley, Horace, 297. 
Green Bay, 76, 2,2,2,, 337- 
Griffon, see under Ships. 
Groseillers, 39. 

Hamilton, Gen., at Detroit, 151- 
153; captured by Clark, 153. 

Harmar, Gen., unsuccessful ex- 
pedition against Indians, 156, 
161, 174. 

Harriott, John, journey to Lake 
Erie, 242-246. 

Harrison, Gen. W. H., at Tippe- 
canoe, 166; Lake Erie expedi- 
tion, 179, 180; battle of the 
Thames, 187-189. 

Harvey, C. T., designer and builder 
of "Soo" Canal, 362-364. 

Hawley, Jesse, and Erie Canal, 237. 

Heald, Capt., in command at Fort 
Dearborn, 172-177; escapes mas- 
sacre, 176, 177. 

Hennepin, Father Louis, compan- 
ion of La Salle, 51; writes of 
Niagara, 52, 53; and of the 
voyage, 58, 59; names Lake St. 
Clair, 63. 

Henry, Alexander, adventures at 
Mackinac, 135-150; copper min- 
ing, 347- 



Hines, Capt., Confederate agent, 
321, 322. 

Hotels, American, and Franklin, 
in Cleveland, 273; Lake House, 
in Chicago, 277, 278; Tremont 
House, in Chicago, 307, 308, 
314, 316. 

Hull, Gen., in War of 181 2, 166- 
172; surrenders Detroit, 171. 

Huron, Lake, discovered and ex- 
plored, 10-14, 25-28, 37, 65, 71, 
88, 150, 218; travel on, 282; 
commerce of, 336, 337, 360, 372. 

Illinois, part of Northwest Territory, 
155; becomes a state, 193; Black 
Hawk War in, 201-214; in 1840, 
266, 267, 269, 270; in 1850-1860, 
299, 300, 302, 304, 305; in Civil 
War, 318. 

Indiana, part of Northwest Terri- 
tory, 155, 165; becomes a terri- 
tory, 191; becomes a state, 193; 
in 1840, 266, 267; in Civil War, 
318. 

Indian treaties, with La Salle, 56; 
with La Barre, 76-83; with Le 
Moyne, 102; with Johnson, 131- 
133, 145, 149; with Wayne 
(Treaty of Greenville), 162, 164, 
219, 222; with Cass, 198-200, 
224, 225; with U. S. government, 
202. 

Indian tribes, Iroquois or Five Na- 
tions, location and organization, 
II, 12, 232; their relations to the 
French, 17-22, 36-38, 54, 60, 
74-84; at Niagara, 102, 217; 
Hurons, location, 12-16; at war 
with Iroquois, 16-23, 36, 37; 
Algonquins, 12, 114; Neutral 
Nation, 23', Ojibways, 114; 
Ottawas, 114, 120, 144, 145; 
Illinois, 114, 134; Chippewas, 
138-145; Sauk and Fox, 202- 
214. For Mohawks, Oneidas, 
Onondagas, Cayugas, Senecas, 
see under Iroquois. 

Iroquois Trail, 231, 232, 251. 



39^ 



Index 



Jesuits, missions to Hurons, 25-38; 
to Iroquois, ^8; at Sault Ste. 
Marie, 34, 35, 39; at La Pointe, 
39, 41 ; at Manitoulin Island, 41. 

Jogues, Father Isaac, Jesuit mis- 
sionary, among Hurons, 32, 34; 
visits and names Sault Ste. Marie, 
35; captured and kiUed by 
Iroquois, 35, 36. ^ 

Johnson, Sir William, captures 
Niagara, 106-111; Indian con- 
ferences, 131, 132, 133, 146-149. 

Johnston, Albert, 207. 

Joncaire, loi, 108. 

La Barre, Gen. Le Febvxe de, 73- 
84; expedition against Iroquois, 
74-84. 

La Motte, companion of La Salle, 

53-56. 

La Pointe, 39, 41. 

La Salle, Robert Cavelier, Sieur 
de, early career, 49-51; builds 
the Griffon, 56-60; on Lakes 
Erie, Huron, and Michigan, 61- 

71- 
Le Caron, Father Joseph, 10, 15, 16. 
Le Moyne, Charles (ist), 103. 
Le Moyne, Charles (2d), with La 

Barre, 75, 80, 82, 104. 
Le Moyne, Charles (3d), builds 

Fort Niagara, 102-104. 
Le Moyne, Father, 38. 
Lewiston, 54, 102, 232, 238. 
Lincoln, Abraham, in Black Hawk 

War, 206; debates with Douglas, 

300, 302, 308-311; nominated 

for presidency, 311-314. 
Lockport, 253, 256, 257, 264. 
Logan, Gen. John A., 3, 316. 
Lumber, forest distribution, 342, 

343; industry, 343-347- 

McDougall, Lieut., at Detroit, 124, 
126. 

Mackinac (called Michilimackinac, 
Mackinaw), trading post, 66, 67, 
88, 218, 223, 224, 281 ; North- 
west Fur Company and Ameri- 



can Fur Company station, 335- 
32>^y 357 > lumber region, 344; fort 
at, 118, 135-150, 166, 168, 169, 
177, 224, 268. 

Manitoulin Island, 41, 281. 

Marquette, 42, 218. 

Massachusetts land cession, 220. 

Melish, John, journey in western 
New York, 246-248. 

Menard, Father, on Lake Superior, 

39- 
Michigan, part of Northwest Terri- 
tory, 155; a separate territory 
under Cass, 191-196; becomes a 
state, 196; in 1840, 266, 267; 
railroads, 284-288; lumber trade, 
343-345; mineral wealth, 347- 

351- 

Michigan, Lake, discovered and 
explored, 35, 39, 40, 49. 67-71; 
forts on, 70, 118, 119, 166, 172- 
178; settlement on, 198, 200, 222, 
223; travel on, 279-281; com- 
merce of, 337, 357, 361, 369, 370. 

Michigan City, in 1840, 266, 276; 
underground railroad station, 302. 

Milwaukee, founded, 223, 224; in 
1840, 266, 279, 280; fur trade of, 
337; port for grain, 369; rapid 
growth, 374, 375- 

Minerals, copper, 4, 8, 347, 348; 
iron, 4, 8, 348-354, 367-369; 
lead, 201, 202. 

Minnesota, lumber trade, 343, 344, 
346; mineral wealth, 352-354. 

New York, home of Iroquois tribes, 
II, 12; Indian trails, 231, 232; 
turnpikes, 232-236, 242-250; 
canals, 237, 250-265; railroads, 
238-241, 291-298. 

Niagara, discovered, 52-61 ; held 
by French, 101-105; taken by 
English, 1 05-1 12; Indian con- 
vention at, 132, 149; in War of 
1812, 181, 182, 189. 

Niagara Falls, location, 5 ; seen by 
Hennepin, 52, 53; description of, 
53; visited, 246. 



Index 



397 



Niagara, Fort, built, 101-105; cap- 
tured by British, 1 05-1 13; centre 
of British influence, 153. 

Niagara River, key to the lakes, 54- 
60; in War of 1812, 181, 182, 189. 

Nicolet, 35, 331. 

Nipissing, Lake, 13, 27, 34, 218. 

Northwestern Fur Company, 224, 
335, 338-341. 

Ohio, part of Northwest Territory, 
155; becomes a state, 191; in 
1840, 266, 267; canals, 283, 284; 
railroads, 284-291 ; underground 
railroad, 301, 302; in Civil War, 
318. 

Onondaga, see Syracuse. 

Ontario, Lake, discovered and ex- 
plored, 17, 22, 52, 56, 75; forts 
on, 52, 61, 100-112, 189, 218; 
travel on, 242 ; commerce of, 336. 

Ordinance of 1787, 155, 191. 

Oswego, trading post, 102, 105, 
3ZZ\ Johnson at, 132, 133; fort, 
219; village, 220, 221. 

Pennsylvania, canals, 284; rail- 
roads, 291-297; 299, 302, 368. 

Perrot, Nicholas, 201. 

Perry, Oliver Hazard, early life, 
181; in charge of Lake Erie 
fleet, 1 81 -1 82; battle of Lake 
Erie, 183-187, 190. 

Pontiac, meets Rogers, 113; char- 
acter and early career, 113-116; 
blockades Detroit, 1 1 9-1 31 ; later 
life and death, 133. 

Pouchot, Capt., French officer at 
Niagara, 105; besieged by Eng- 
lish, 1 06-1 1 1 ; surrenders, 1 11 . 

Prideaux, Gen., killed at Niagara, 
105, 106. 

Proctor, Gen. Henry, at Maiden, 
180, 187; defeated, 188, 189. 

Radisson, 39. 

Railroads, Mohawk and Hudson, 
238, 240; New York Central, 
241, 291, 298; Michigan Central, 



284, 287, 288; Kalamazoo and 
Erie, 285, 286; Michigan South- 
ern, 285 ; Cleveland, Columbus, 
and Cincinnati, 288-291 ; New 
York and Erie, 291-298; Illi- 
nois Central, 305, 306; Iron 
Mountain Road, 351; see also 
under Roads. 
Rivers, Chicago, 70, 218, 222; 
Cuyahoga, 113, 219; Detroit, see 
under Detroit River; Fox- Wis- 
consin, 98, 218; Genesee, 56, 
220, 233, 235, 246, 252, 257; 
Illinois, 66, 71, 106; Maumee, 
133, 159. 178, 179. 218, 276, 284; 
Milwaukee, 223; Mississippi, 

12, 49, 104, 154, 155, 201-203, 
211, 218, 225, 299; Mohawk, 232, 
237, 246, 252, 259, 264; Niagara, 
see under Niagara River; Ohio, 
49, 104, 154, 158, 165, 228, 284, 
302; Oswego, 102; Ottawa, 10, 

13. 27, 51. 90. 154, 218; Raisin, 
1 79-1 81; Rock, 201-208, 212; 
Sandusky, 183, 187; St. Croix, 
225, 344; St. Joseph's, 70, 119, 
161, 218, 275; St. Lawrence, 
12, 13, 74, 84, 96, 104, 147, 236; 
Thames, 188-190; Wabash, 177, 
218; Wisconsin, 201, 202, 210, 
211, 212. 

Roads, buffalo roads, 229, 230; 
Indian trails, 230-232; turn- 
pikes, 232-236, 247-250; log- 
roads, 243; railroads, 238-241, 
283-298, 305, 344, 351. 353- 

Rochester, founded, 220; turnpike 
to, 235, 236; on Erie Canal, 252; 
canal celebration at, 257, 258. 

Rochester, Nathaniel, 220, 235. 

Rogers, Major Robert, meets Pon- 
tiac, 113; at Detroit, 116, 128, 
129. 

Rome, 232, 258, 259. 

Saginaw, 198, 344. 

St. Clair, Gen., his defeat, 156-159, 

174. 
St. Clair, Lake, named, 63, 64. 



398 



Index 



Saint Lusson, Daumont de, his cere- 
mony at Sault Ste. Marie, 40-48. 

Sandusky, in 1840, 268, 272, 273; 
Underground Railroad station, 
302; in Civil War, 322-325, 328; 
see also under Forts. 

Sandwich, American army at, 168, 
169; evacuated by British, 187, 
188. 

SauJt Ste. Marie, discovered, 34, 35, 
39; Saint Lusson at, 39-48; 
Henry at, 137, 145-148; Cass at, 
199; Margaret Fuller at, 282; 
"Soo" Canal built, 7, 8, 351, 
362-365 ; commerce of, 8, 364, 372. 

Schenectady, 232, 238, 240, 268. 

Scott, Gen. Winfield, in Black Hawk 
War, 207, 212. 

Ships, kinds of, bateau, 127, 129, 
358, 359; canal boat, 255-259, 
261-264; canoe, 356-359; pi- 
rogue, 359; saiHng vessel, 359, 
360, 365; steamboats, 268, 
269, 279, 360-362, 371; steel 
freighters, 365-370; whalebacks, 
370, 371; ice-breakers, 371, 372; 
Griffon, first sailing vessel on the 
lakes, 51-69; built by La Salle, 
51-60; on the lakes, 61-68; lost, 
69. 359» 373; Beaver, at Detroit, 
120, 127, 359; Gladwin, at De- 
troit, 120, 126, 127, 130, 359; 
ships in battle of Lake Erie, 183- 
187; on Erie Canal, 255-259; in 
Civil War, 322-326, 329; Walk-in- 
the-Water, first steamboat on the 
lakes, 360, 361, 373. 

Sons of Liberty, 318-322, 328. 

Stage wagons, 234, 236, 243-245, 
247, 248. 

Superior, Indian trading station, 
224, 225; became a town, 225; 
commerce of, 344, 369. 

Superior, Lake, discovered and ex- 
plored, 39, 198-200, 224; settle- 
ment on, 225; commerce of, 
336-341, 344, 347-354, 357, 360- 
37°- 

Syracuse (Onondaga), 232, 252, 264. 



Taylor, Col. Zachary, 207. 

Tecumseh, leads Indian uprising, 
165, 166; with the British, 169, 
170, 187-189; killed, 189. 

Toledo, in 1840, 266, 276; terminus 
of canal and railroad, 284, 2S7; 
rapid growth, 375, 383. 

Tolls, table of, 235, 236. 

Tonty, companion of La Salle, 56, 
70. 

Tonty, Madame, 96. 

Toronto, 148, 219. 

Tower, Charlemagne, opens iron 
mines, 352, 354. 

Travel, bibliography, 389-391 ; to 
Lake Erie, in 1796, 242-246; in 
181 1, 246-250; on Erie Canal, 
261-263; on the Great Lakes in 
1840, 266-282. 

Travellers, John Harriott, 242- 
246; John Melish, 246-248; an 
Englishwoman, 248, 249; Anne 
Roy all, 261-263; Margaret Ful- 
ler, 278-282. 

Treaties, treaty of Paris, 1782, 153, 
154; Jay's treaty, 1796, 163; 
treaty of Ghent, 181 4, 190; see 
also Indian treaties. 

Turnpikes, see under Roads. 

Two Harbors, 353, 354. 

Underground Railroad, 301, 302. 
Utica (Fort Schuyler), 232, 233, 238, 
245, 248, 260, 262, 

Walk-in-the-Water, see under Ships. 

Wayne, Anthony, Indian campaign, 
156-164; makes treaty of Green- 
ville, 162; death, 164. 

Wells, William, at Fort Dearborn 
massacre, 174-177. 

Wigwam, Republican, 311-315. 

Wisconsin, part of Northwest 
Territory, 155; called Huron 
district, 193; Black Hawk 
War in, 201, 210-212; in 1840, 
266, 267; lumber trade, 343- 
346; mineral wealth, 351, 352, 
354- 



Stories from American History 



Yankee Ships and Yankee Sailors 

By JAMES BARNES 

Tales of 1812, by the author of " Drake and his Yeomen," " For King 
and Country," etc. Illustrated by R. F. Zogbaum and Carlton T. 

Chapman. 

Cloth ^ $1.50 

The Wilderness Road 

By H. ADDINGTON BRUCE 

The central figure in this story of the early development of the 
Middle West is Daniel Boone, the man who blazed the famous Wil- 
derness road. In telling his story Mr. Bruce touches on such matters 
as the economic and social factors influencing the movement across 
the mountains, and the significance of that movement with relation to 
the growth of revolutionary sentiment in the American colonies, etc. 

To be illustrated. 

In preparation 

The Story of the Great Lakes 

By EDWARD CHAKNING and MARION F. LANSING 

The Professor of American History in Harvard University, author of 
a number of volumes on the History of the United States, has found 
an immense amount of romance centred about the Great Lakes, 
from the time of their discovery and early exploration by the French 
missionaries down to the present time when they play so important a 
part in the industrial progress of the Middle West. This book tells 
the story of these great inland waterways, with special reference to 
those picturesque aspects of history which interest the general reader. 
To be illustrated. 

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The Story of Old Fort Loudon 

By CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK 

A Tale of the Cherokees and the Pioneers of Tennessee, 1760, by the 
author of " The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains." Illustrated 
by Ernest C. Peixotto. 

Cloth, $1.50 



STORIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY — Continued 



Southern Soldier Stories 

By GEORGE GARY EGGLESTON 

Forty-seven stories illustrating the heroism of those brave Americans 
who fought on the losing side in the Civil War. Humor and pathos 
are found side by side in these pages, which bear evidence of absolute 
truth. Illustrated by R. F. Zogbaum. 

Cloth, $i.jo 



Tales of the Enchanted Isles of the Atlantic 

By THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON 

Legends showing that the people of Europe were for centuries fed 
with romances of marvellous and beautiful countries beyond the 
Atlantic. Besides the early Irish, Spanish, and other traditions of the 
Happy Islands of the West, there come to us, among others from our 
own race, the old stories of King Arthur and his Avalon ; of St. 
Brandan's Isle ; of the Voyages of Erik the Viking ; and of the 
vanishing Norumbega, so real a vision to the imaginations of Queen 
Elizabeth's day. Illustrated by Albert Herter. 

Cloth, $1.50 

De Soto and His Men in the Land of Florida 

By GRACE KING 

The author of " New Orleans : The Place and the People " has col- 
lected into an entertaining volume stories of the brilliant armada 
which sailed westward under De Soto in 1538 to subdue the natives 
and bring this country under the Spanish crown. Old Spanish and 
Portuguese narratives are the basis of its history. Illustrated by 

George Gibbs. 

Cloth, $1.50 



STORIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY - Cb/i^mt/ec/ 



The Story of the New England Whalers 

By JOHN R. SPEARS 

Some of the most romantic and adventurous characters in American 
history are dealt with in this book, in which Mr. Spears tells the story 
of the American whaling industry. He has given us the life stories 
of the men who made New Bedford, Nantucket, and Marblehead — 
the men to wliom more than to any others was due the upbuilding of 
the American merchant service in the early days of the Republic. 
Illustrated from photographs. 

Cloth, $1.50 



Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coast 

By FRANK R. STOCKTON 

This book is an account — with efforts to sift falsifying legend and 
preserve the truth — of the offshoots of the early English, French, 
and Dutch combinations against Spanish exactions in West India 
waters. From the early buccaneer with a legitimate purpose came 
the pirate whose greed of booty was for private gain. Mr. Stockton 
has told wild stories of picturesque figures among both types of 
leaders, and his characteristic quaint turns of humor set them off 
entertainingly. Illustrated by G. Varian and B. W. Clinedinst. 

Cloth J $1.50 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

64-66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 



Abraham Lincoln 

The Boy and the Man 

By JAMES MORGAN 

Wiih Many Interesting Portraits and Other Illustrations, many 
of them secured for the book from Private Collections 

Cloth, $1.50 

You may already know the great events of Lincoln's life, but you will 
still find this simple, clear, straightforward story of the early hard 
work, the slow study for the practice of law, the single-minded stand 
" for the Union," and the brave, quiet facing of every difficulty, the 
most fascinating record of any human life which you have known. 

The Chicago Tribune says of it editorially : " It tells the life story 
well. It is interesting. It is well written. It gives the significant 
facts one wants to know." 



The Seven Ages of Washington 

By OWEN WISTER 

Attractively hound, illustrated in photogravure, $2.00 net 

The New York Tribune savs of it : " ' The Seven Ages of Washing- 
ton "... gives a remarkable interpretation of its subject. ... It is 
plain that the author has been moved to the depths of him by his 
hero's worth, finding in the traditionally 'cold' figure of Washington 
a type to touch the emotions as vividly as Napoleon touches them in 
even his most dramatic moments. He passes on his impression m a 
few chapters which gather up everyday traits as they come out in 
letters and other records. The salient events in Washington's career, 
military and political, are indicated rather than dwelt upon. The 
object of interest is always his character; the things placed in the 
foreground are the episodes, great or small, which show us that char- 
acter in action or point to the sources of its development. . . . The 
background, like the portrait, is handled with perfect discretion. 
The reader who is searching for an authoritative biography of Wash- 
ington, brief, and made humanly interesting from the first page to the 
last, will find it here." 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

64-66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 



^^0 9 66 



u; 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



016 098 782 



